The story of Puerto Rico’s power grid is the story of Puerto Rico

Elon, where are you?

IN A room beneath the smokestacks of the Aguirre steam plant in south-eastern Puerto Rico, an engineer points to a colourful poster entitled “How Electricity Arrives at Your Home”. In normal circumstances, explains Alexis Torres, burning oil turns water to steam, which spins mechanical turbines and sends energy out through power lines that criss-cross the island territory. Hurricane Maria made landfall 30 miles from the Aguirre steam plant. The south-east, where coal and oil plants generate much of the island’s electricity, suffered the worst damage.

A month later, 82% of Puerto Ricans still lack power. The island operates a centralised electricity grid: the plants in the south-east provide power to beach resorts in the north-west and metropolitan San Juan; 80% of the power lines were destroyed by the storm. Restoring them is a finicky process. By October 10th 16% of the island’s power had been restored. Later that day it...Continue reading

Source: United States http://ift.tt/2yA43fa

Share this

Related Posts

Previous
Next Post »