By ANNELIA NIXON

Tribune Business Reporter

anixon@tribunemedia.net

Energy woes have intensified on Eleuthera due to the passage of Tropical Storm Imelda with some parts of the island experiencing outages of more than 38 hours.

Bahamas Power & Light’s (BPL) direct WhatsApp channel advised that gusty winds and adverse weather caused outages throughout Eleuthera and other islands as the storm passed. Up to yesterday, BPL noted that multiple islands including Inagua, Mayaguana, Long Cay, Acklins, Crooked Island, Long Island, Rum Cay, San Salvador and Cat Island had reported outages.

It added that, on Eleuthera, operational teams were addressing power issues in The Bluff impacting around 30 consumers - including the area’s primary school - as well as some ten consumers in The Current and one consumer in Whale Point.

Former local government representative for the settlement of Current, Aldred Albury, said the northern part of Eleuthera had experienced prolonged outages.

“There is one section that, over the last 48 hours, they've only had about three hours of electricity, which was actually last night,” Mr Albury said. “BPL came down and was able to restore it, but it only lasted for about three hours, and then it tripped back out.

"So they're still waiting for the technicians to come now to get that sorted out. It was off in a particular area in Current for about 38 hours, and then it came on for about three hours and they went back off, and it's still as of now.”

Thomas Sands, president of the Eleuthera Chamber of Commerce, said residents and businesses were experiencing extended outages before the island felt the storm’s impact.

“In fact, it started I felt prior to the storm system even getting near us,” Mr Sands said. “So this is a process that started on Friday evening. We started to experience power problems prior to a storm being in our immediate area. And so there were extended periods prior to, there were extended periods during and, I think, up until yesterday I thought all areas had come back on.

“I could say at this point I think there are great concerns about the direction that we are heading in as consumers of utilities on Eleuthera. And I think there's a great question about the capacity of utilities to service Eleuthera, and to service it at the level that it's at and the level that is projected to come. So there are great, great question marks.”