Sen. Darcy Boyce
The BU household is not comprised of the sharpess ‘blackled’ in the case therefore understanding government’s energy diversification strategy after six years in office has become somewhat of a mystery. If it is a key policy measure to restructure the economy we are not ‘feeling’ it.
State entities are the largest consumers of fossil energy in Barbados,. Barbados Water Authority and Grantley Adams Airport come to mind. Why has the government not embarked on an aggressive implementation of solar, wind or combination alternative energy systems at these locations?
At the residential level we have a role to play to conserve and transition to alternative sources but it is always the most sensible approach to grab the quick wins. The apolitical among us understand that energy diversification to mitigate volatility associated with oil price is a sensible approach. All issues in Barbados are converted to being political and amidst the noise of the RE debate any semblance of a nation awakening to the benefit of this issue has been suppressed.
The launch recently of an initiative by a local company to import electric cars provoked a chuckle in the BU household. There is a government endorsed program to conserve energy and to rollout alternative energy initiatives BUT we are importing electric cars to feed from a grid which is fossil powered. BU welcomes the electric and hybrid vehicles BUT how does it merge with the goal of energy diversification?. We need to incent the individual who wants to buy an energy saving vehicle to retrofit the garage to be powered by non fossil power supply.
