15672: Allouard: Re: 15612: Durban Suggests Aristide Grab the Initiative (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Philippe Allouard <allouard@libertysurf.fr>

Just an opinion on the electricity problem:

    Everyone speaks/dreams about a 24/24 7/7 service from Ed'H...

    I think it is a mistake : Before considering the QUANTITY of electricity
Ed'H provides, one should consider the QUALITY of the service it provides.

    Personaly, I don't really care if I have electricity all the time or
not... Actually, blackout allows me to enjoy some peace, not being deafened
by Compas, Racine and Rap music altogether issued by my neighbours... and it
is also a chance to enjoy the tropical sky at night with so clear and big
the stars that they seem really closer than in Europe... But this is an
egotistic an almost irrelevant point. [ I also prefer to receive a 125 gdes
bill than a 495 one!!! the first one when the breaker is down during one
week and the 3 other weeks I have electricity 3 hours every other day, the
later when I have several hours electricity almost every day]

    The point is that the more important to order your house work or to run
a business is to know WHEN and FOR HOW LONG you will have electricity...
Many countries have not electricity 24 hours a day... But many countries
have an electricity company, or several, that tell the customers : your area
will be provided with electricity from 3 PM to 7 PM [or, in more developped
economies: your area will lack electricity Friday May the 23rd from 2 to 7
PM in order for us to do maintenance work]... the point is this:

    If you know when you have / have not electricity, you can organize
yourself.

    You can plan ironing; you know if, when, and how much ice you need to
buy for your small cool beverages shop; you know when you need to put your
cell phone in charge; you know when you can open you small barber shop; you
know if you can see the football match home or visit a friend having an
inverter, or living in an area having electricity at the time... you know if
you will need one, two ore 3 gallons of gaz for your lamps; and if you have
a generator, I have not, you know how many gallons of gazoline you have to
buy every week... You also know when to plug or unplug equipements that do
not like changes in alimentation...
    And if you run a business, it is usefull to know WHEN you can do the
maintenance job on your generator or inverter without risking to shut down
all your equipments... it is usefull to know what exactly will be your need
of diesel and gazoline and to budget almost precisely what your expenses
will be in ED'H electricity and in diesel for the "delko"...

    Here is the idea: better 3 hours a day I know when than 49 hours a week
I don't know when.

    But nothing of this happens here... You have electricity one day during
12, 18 or even 20 hours, and not the day after... or during the next 2 or 3
days... you have it 10 minutes first, and after you have half an hour
black-out, and one hour again, and blakawout again... you have 110V most of
the time but enjoy also from time to time a french 220V (how your american
equipment DO love the french power tension, one can imagine, and, believe
me, it is not enough to call it "freedom power" to have your Wespoint fridge
enjoying it!!!)... The words coming to my lips are too often: "but what are
they playing at?!"

    What Ed'H lacks first, it seems, is not power but planification and,
perhaps, technical competence.

    Obviously, the fact that in my area not 1 on 2 houses has a legal
connection (and, believe me, not only the people that cannot afford the 47
to 400 gourdes monthly bill do take an illegal connection, and several have
one legal connection, [consumption almost zero], AND one or TWO illegal
hook-ups) is not helping Ed'H to regulate its service: lines are fragilised
by the artisanal hook-ups, breakers are down every other week because
pressure is higher that the one the equipment is made for, and it is a
regular accident that a transformation box burns or explodes, not rarely
killing or burning several persons... [few days ago, one burnt in
Port-au-Prince, and the fire was so huge that it was like a firework but
all concentrated in time and in space... impressive!!!] Not to speak of the
extra weight all the illegal lines represent for the wooden, rotten pilars.

    Financial collect for the service is surely a problem...
    All the worst perhaps because the service Ed'H provides is more
expensive for its best customers. Factories and businesses pay something
like twice more the kWH... and as they still have to buy powerfull
generators and inverters, one does not see what the good is for the
economy... the people pay the bill nevertheless because goods are more
expensive, and exportation is not helped...

    But I am not economist, neither electrician; nor do I have the tough job
to govern Ed'H... It is just the opinion I can have living in a popular area
and seing how things are there...

    And Lance has probably right in this: people do not understand they have
to pay the bill... Electricity is considered like a human right or something
State has to provide, not like a good one has to buy... and the NGOs and
developped country speach often pushes in this sense... But is there a right
here? I wonder...

    Best regards.

                                Philippe Allouard