April 8, 2008 — With energy costs on the rise across the Virgin Islands as well as other territories, two U.S. House of Representatives subcommittees will hold a joint hearing on the issue Saturday at the Legislature in Frederiksted.
The hearing begins at 10 a.m. at the Fritz E. Lawaetz conference room.
The Subcommittee on Insular Affairs — chaired by Delegate Donna M. Christensen — and the Subcommittee on Energy and Mineral Resources will take testimony from federal and local officials and alternative-energy providers. The hearings will address the energy challenges facing the insular areas and the potential for energy-efficiency measures and alternative energy to address those challenges.
"With the cost of energy being a worldwide problem that is exacerbated in the territories, it is necessary to get our specific needs before the Congress, so that we can be a part of any solution that is crafted by the body," Christensen said in a news release issued Monday.
According to the congresswoman, Virgin Islands, Guam, American Samoa and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands pay far higher electricity rates than the rest of the United States because they are almost entirely dependent on imported foreign fuel sources.
The territories share a number of severe energy problems, she said. As islands, they lack interconnection to larger electrical grids that would provide emergency backup power or economies of scale.
Lacking indigenous sources of fossil fuels, they are almost entirely dependent on imported oil or refined petroleum products for electricity generation. This dependence causes electricity prices to track with petroleum prices, contributing to electricity rates higher than anywhere else in the United States.
In addition, the tropical marine environment of the insular areas creates maintenance difficulties for energy equipment, as corrosion is accelerated in humid, salty air. Additionally, the frequency of tropical storms on the Virgin Islands, Guam and the Northern Marianas makes the installation of renewable energy-generating equipment more troublesome and expensive.
The public is invited to submit testimony for the record. The record will remain open until two weeks after the hearing date.
Bevan Smith, director of the V.I. Energy Office, will testify at the hearing.
Energy Office spokesman Don Buchanan said the office is happy that attention is being paid to the territory's energy issues.
"It's good they're focusing on it," he said.
The Energy Office and the V.I. Water and Power Authority both contributed to a report by the U.S. Interior Department that outlines the energy problems in the territory, Buchanan said.
In addition to Smith, those invited to testify include Sen. Raymond "Usie" Richards, V.I. Water and Power Authority Director Hugo Hodge and President Daryll Miller of the St. Croix Alliance to Protect Utility Ratepayers.
Also making remarks will be Robert Nicholson III of Sea Solar Power International, James Resor of groSolar, Tony Orlando of Covanta Holding and Jim Powell, a senior policy advisor at the Southern States Energy Board. Also testifying will be Nikolao Pula, acting deputy assistant secretary for Insular Affairs at the U.S. Interior Department, and Drew Bond, a senior advisor at the U.S. Energy Office's Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy.
Energy Subcommittee Chairman Rep. Jim Costa and Rep. Bill Schuster are expected to attend.
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