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source: www.dailystar.com.lb
BEIRUT: Maintenance, equipment failures and the continued stoppage of the Fatmagül barge combined to dim Lebanon’s electricity supply over the weekend, with power cuts increasing from three to more than nine hours even in rarely rationed central Beirut. Scheduled maintenance works on a major Electricité du Liban power plant in Zahrani, south of Sidon, has resulted in the additional rationing, an EDL spokesperson told the Daily Star.
A failure at the Deir Ammar plant last week and the stoppage of the Turkish electricity barge contracted by the state-run firm only exacerbated the situation.
“[The Zahrani plant] has been sealed off completely from the network starting from 3 a.m. Friday to Saturday afternoon. The No. 2 natural gas [generator] unit will remain out of service for three days until maintenance is completed,” EDL said Friday.
“[The maintenance works] coincided with failures at the Deir Ammar plant which was sealed off [from the national grid] after bad weather conditions resulted in an electric shock.”
The Daily Star’s correspondent in south Lebanon reported that electricity service dwindled to 4 hours, adding that it had improved to between 12 and 14 hours, depending on the location, a few months ago.
He also said owners of power generators had made it clear that 5-ampere subscription fees would be hiked significantly if cuts linger on this week.
The paper’s correspondent in north Lebanon said the area had only seen a 3-hour increase in rationing over the weekend because the Deir Ammar failure did not directly affect their local electricity supply.
He said the bad weather conditions cited by EDL had damaged high-voltage links between Deir Ammar, Zouk and Zahrani, meaning local supply had not been as harmed as in other areas.
The EDL spokesperson expected electricity service to return to normal particularly in Beirut starting Monday.
The operators of Turkish electricity barge Fatmagül Sultan said last week that the boat was restored after fixing failures resulting from poor-quality fuel supplies by EDL.
Energy Minister Gebran Bassil told a local newspaper Friday that the barge was expected to resume production in one week, after the needed fuel supplies were arranged for by EDL.
