How CMI, UTECH, OUR and JPS Co can solve 11,000 Day Burning Streetlights Problem

While Jamaicans rejoice as the prospect of paying for their Light bills via JPS Co (Jamaica Public Service Company) PAYG (Pay as You Go) Prepaid Power System as described in my blog article entitled “JPS Co's Prepaid Power now in Jamaica - How @myJPSonline PAYG means a Digital Meter with smartphone App for 5 KWh Advances”, the GOJ still has a huge monster of a problem.

I am of course referring to the defective Day burning streetlights in Jamaica, many of which have defective photo-sensors and are on in the daytime as per the investigation in the article “Street-Light Stress - Billions of Dollars Burnt by Malfunctioning Lamps”, Published Sunday April 26, 2015 by Tyrone Thompson, The Jamaica Gleaner.

The problem has resurfaced as the OUR (Office of Utilities Regulation) is claiming that 11,000 street lights are staying on 24 hours each day for the past six (6) months, resulting in the Ministry of Local Government having to fork out some JA$3 billion to pay for the wasted electricity.

That 11,000 streetlight is roughly about 12% of 93,000 streetlights that fall under the responsibility of the Ministry of Local Government. It also translates to JA$104 million in property tax revenues and thousands of kilowatt-hours of energy down the drain

The JPS Co of course, is claiming that this is false, questioning the methodology that the OUR used to determine that figure. JPS Co claims that it had repaired some 27,698 malfunctioning street lights islandwide in 2014.

This included the so-called day burning streetlights but their ability to repair them is being constrained because the Ministry of Local Government is slow to pay their Electricity bills.

In short, it’s a chicken vs the Egg scenario or a Catch 22 situation. JPS Can't fix these day burning streetlight as it does have the money to effect repairs because the Ministry of Local Government isn’t paying their electivity bills on time.

Meanwhile the Ministry of Local Government is refusing to pay their electricity bills, claiming that they're not paying for the electricity wasted by the day-burning streetlights. Not to mention just not paying their electricity bill on time for electricity actually being used by the GOJ (Government of Jamaica).

JPS and OUR Day Burning Streetlight Problem – JA$3 billion dollar problem Part II

This is the same problem that was highlighted back in November 2011 by  JPS Co (Jamaica Public Service Company) Corporate Communications Manager Winsome Callum as reported in my blog article entitled “Alternative Energy Contract for JPS Co Streetlight Upgrade Coming - JPS Co Winsome Callum's Bourne Supremacy”.

Since January 2014, a contractor named Green Energy RG (Green RG Management LLC) had been retrofitting some streetlight, converting them to LED in Clarendon, Kingston and St. Andrew and St. Catherine as stated in my blog article entitled “Green Energy RG installing 5000 Solar Powered LED Streetlights in Jamaica - Local Government's the Gangster Squad from West of Memphis towards a more Energy Efficient GOJ”.

However the JPS Co has had to contend with the problem of thieves using the Streetlight to power their Speaker systems whenever they throw a street dance as well as criminals who destroy them to robe persons passing on what would normally be a well lit roadway as explained in the article “Light Thieves Target Streetlights”, Published Thursday October 31, 2013, The Jamaica Gleaner and “Streetlights being used to steal electricity”, published Wednesday, October 30, 2013, The Jamaica Observer.

So the argument aside, what can be done about this problem? Actually we already have a solution at hand.

JPS Co vs OUR in Day Burning Streetlights – How CMI and UTECH Engineering can solve the problem

The solution really is to get CMI (Caribbean Maritime Institute) and UTECH (University of Technology) Engineering student to survey and retrofit these disputed streetlight to LED ) Light Emitting Diode).

Some two hundred (200) of these streetlights along the Palisados Highway from the Norman Manley International Airport to Rockfort and Port Royal in East Kingston have been upgraded to LED (Light Emitting Diodes) Streetlights by the engineers at the CMI (Caribbean Maritime Institute) back in December 2014 as reported in my blog article entitled “200 Palisados Streetlights upgrade to LED Lightbulbs by CMI, JPS - How 93,000 Streetlights and Traffic Lights can go off-Grid using Solar and Wind Power”.

Back then, I’d suggested the idea of procuring an alternative Energy Contractor to retrofit the streetlights with Solar Panels and Batteries so as to take them off the grid completely. The retrofit would not only fix the problem for defective photocells but also upgrade the light to LED (Light Emitting Diode), which are more effect and use less power and give a better, brighter daylight glow.

Perhaps the CMI initiative needs to be expanded islandwide in conjunction with UTECH (University of Technology) to retrofit these defective day burning streetlights as a major summer project.

CMI and UTECH – 93,000 Streetlights upgraded to LED and eventually Solar in three Summers

They would re-do the survey and as the defective streetlights are spotted, they’d retrofit them to LED. These LED could possibly be procured from Cuba as per Minsiter of Science Technology, Energy and Mining Philip Paulwell’s Cuba-Jamaica Compact Fluorescent Lamp (CFL) Project as described in my blog article entitled “Minister Paulwell revives Cuban Light Bulb Program - How to Ban Incandescent Bulbs and focus on production of LED Bulbs in Jamaica”. 

In so doing, the JPS Co and the OUR could not only have the problem solved over the Summer of 2015 but also help aspiring Engineers, the top paying job in the US of A according to NACE (National Association of Colleges and Employers) as stated in my Geezam blog article entitled “Why Technology Companies are Seeking Engineers”.

If this project is undertaken, then by the Summer of 2016, as an extension of this idea, they can then be taken off the Grid using Solar Panels, with the excess power generated being sold to the JPS Co Grid, turning streetlight into a source of Revenue for the Ministry of Local Government.

Finally to add a technological twist, the Ministry of Local Government can team up with the Ministry of Science, Technology Energy and Mining to add Wi-Fi to these Streetlights under the E-Learning TIS (Tablet in Schools) initiative which also has plans to deploy CAP (Community Access Points) for Wi-Fi in Jamaica.

Thus, children, instead of sitting under streetlights at night, can also access the Internet, making the community have yet another reason to make sure that these new LED Solar powered Street light are always functioning.

In this way, not only would UTECH and CMI get the necessary hands-on experience that they need in order to add a project to their engineering Portfolio, but they’d also get some financial benefit and incentive to continue on in their chosen engineering field.