More equipment, crews head to Puerto Rico for power boost

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico — Federal officials said Monday that efforts to fully restore power to Puerto Rico in the wake of Hurricane Maria should get a boost with more work crews and more supplies in coming weeks.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers said it is getting its own barge to ship items and that materials it requested several months ago have been manufactured and are finally on their way to the U.S. territory.

“We’re doing everything we can to increase the (power company’s) ability to do this as fast as possible for the people of Puerto Rico,” said Col. John Lloyd, who is helping oversee power restoration efforts for the Corps of Engineers.

He said that officials over the weekend also discovered some needed equipment in a previously overlooked warehouse owned by Puerto Rico’s Electric Power Authority.

The lack of some of those hard-to-find pieces had delayed energizing certain lines, according to the Corps of Engineers, which said the material included transformers, splices and hundreds of a key small piece no longer in stock elsewhere.

Puerto Rico’s energy infrastructure is about 44 years old, compared with an average 18 years in the U.S. mainland, so a lot of parts damaged or destroyed by the hurricane are no longer available and have to be manufactured, Lloyd said.

More than 40 percent of Puerto Rico’s power customers remain in the dark nearly four months after the Category 4 storm hit the island, causing an estimated $95 billion in damage and killing dozens of people.

Lloyd said that while crews are still assessing damage, most of the island should have power by the end of February or early March, estimating it could be fully powered by May.