Major power plant slapped landmark RD$12.3M fine

Santo Domingo.- The Electricity Superintendence (SIE) Wednesday announced it levied a RD$12.3 million fine on the power company San Felipe, for allegedly violating the General Law Electricity and its regulation.

The unprecedented sanction against the major facility located in Puerto Plata stems from San Felipe’s ignoring of instructions from the of National Interconnected Electric System Coordinating Agency (OC) and of Energy Control Center (CCE), to adjust its generation to the Minimum Technical Value, as stipulated in SIE resolution SIE-132-2011.

The SIE said a rigorous study and a long work process established the minimum technical values to operate thermal power plants, which involved market agents, the OC and the SIE, and funded by the World Bank.

The resolution signed by SIE Administrative Council president Juan Bautista Gomez affirms that San Felipe’s disregard of norms led to a cost overrun in the market, since the system’s operator had to order the reduction in the output of lower cost plants.