WESTERN BUREAU:

In an effort to improve its generating capacity in St. James and Trelawny, the Jamaica Public Service Company (JPS) on Monday launched its US$4 million (J$264 million) North West System Improvement Project.

Details of the project were disclosed at a press conference at Wexford Court Hotel in Montego Bay, St. James.

"We are looking to make some significant improvements in terms of quality of service and reliability to customers within the area serving largely from Greenwood and the border of Trelawny to St James," JPS regional manager, Wilf Talbot, said.

The project, which will be carried out in areas fed by the Greenwood and Rose Hall substations, is expected to begin the first week of July and is expected to be completed in January 2007.

Some inconvenience

During the improvement works, customers in these areas will experience the inconvenience of scheduled all-day outages, a maximum of four per customer during the period. The substation upgrades will, however, carry shorter periods of outages lasting an hour or less.

Though the effects to traffic regulation will be minimal, the JPS will be instituting traffic management measures and will notify the public in advance.

Works, to be carried out in phases, will include bushing of lines, dressing and replacing of poles.

A major part of the project will be the upgrading of the distribution voltage that will see a capacity increase of 30 megavolt amps (mva) to accommodate the new developments in the areas, including hotels and housing developments.

This will also include an increase in the distribution line voltage from the present 12 kilovolts (12kv) to 24kv. Improvements in the system are expected to significantly decrease the number of power outages and improve power supply.