Governor Extends Energy State of Emergency as WAPA Struggles with Outages, Fuel Shortages

Gov. Albert Bryan Jr. will be moving to extend the energy state of emergency in the Virgin Islands through November 19, marking the fourth such extension since it was first declared in April.

Pending approval from the Legislature, the extension allows the governor to inject much-needed cash into WAPA to help meet its immediate operational needs, particularly when revenue shortfalls prevent the utility from covering essential expenses. “This extension would be helpful,” WAPA Chief Executive Officer Karl Knight said in an interview with the Source on Monday night. “It allows the governor to provide timely and strategic cash infusions to help meet critical obligations when revenue doesn’t allow it – like buying fuel and making payments to vendors.”

WAPA has been struggling with outages across the territory, particularly on St. Thomas, where another series of rotational power outages have plagued residents for the past few days. The outages were triggered by a failure in Unit 15, a key-generating unit that had to be taken offline due to a part failure. “We did not have a replacement part in inventory,” Knight explained Monday evening. “But we were able to get a replacement part from St. Croix, and that arrived today.”