The U.S. government announced Tuesday that it will provide Puerto Rico with temporary electric generation via barges to help´in restoring the island’s storm-devastated power grid and ease repeated widespread outages.
The move will allow crews to take equipment such as substations, transformers and breakers offline for long-needed repairs that are expected to take anywhere from 12 to 18 months, said Puerto Rico Gov. Pedro Pierluisi. It will also provide a boost to a system whose generation capacity has long been waning.
“We know the grid is in a critical state,” he said. “We cannot endure these outages.”