JPS hopes to legitimise 30,000 power thieves by year-end
Published:Sunday | April 24, 2011 | 12:00 AM
The Jamaica Public Service Company (JPS) has projected a 30 per cent reduction in the number of illegal users on its network by December this year as the monopoly power provider steps up its fight against electricity theft.
More than 100,000 users - mainly residential - across the island were said to be illegally connected to the national grid at the start of 2011, according to the JPS.
"At this point, roughly 10 per cent of these users have been formally brought on to the system," said Winsome Callum, corporate communications manager at the JPS.
"It is anticipated that another 20 per cent will be regularised by the end of 2011."
The power company made its projection against the backgrounnd of a new tamper-proof residential automated metering infrastructure system, which so far, has been established in six communities in a move to try and claw back the 23 per cent of electricity that is being lost between generation and transmission.
About 10 per cent of the energy lost is referred to as technical loss resulting from the company's own distribution system.
The JPS has successfully introduced the tamper-proof system to Seaview Gardens, St Andrew; Old Harbour Bay, St Catherine; Retirement, Pitfour, Rasta Camp, Dump, and Hurlock in Montego Bay, St James; and Tivoli Gardens in west Kingston, where it said electricity theft stood as high as 90 per cent between 2010 and 2011.
According to data provided by the JPS, prior to the introduction of the anti-theft system, losses stood at 71 per cent in Seaview Gardens; 64 per cent in sections of the Old Harbour Bay area; 75 per cent in the Montego Bay communities of Retirement, Hurlock, Pitfour, and Rasta Camp; and 90 per cent in Tivoli Gardens.
Loss-control unit
The JPS said that in 2009, it invested close to J$6 billion to establish a loss-control unit comprising 275 persons, who have been engaged in policing and educating communities to eradicate illegal connections, assessing the distribution network to plug weaknesses, and implementing a smart-meter programme to more effectively capture electricity usage.
The company said it was still in the early stages of a five-year accelerated campaign to regularise the roughly 100,000 illegal users and reduce electricity theft.
The five-year programme started last year with the expectation that there would be a 2.03 per cent reduction in 2010.
This year, it is expected that the loss will be reduced by a further 2.17 per cent and by at least one per cent for each year thereafter.