Prime Minister Mia Mottley has hinted at changes to legislation and the introduction of new policies to govern investment in, and production of renewable energy in Barbados. She also suggests that the island was losing out big time on major investment opportunities due to cumbersome regulation and the slow pace of the regulator to make certain decisions.
window.googletag = window.googletag || {cmd: []}; googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.defineSlot('/27575914/BTInsideArticleCovidAd', [[250, 250], [300, 250]], 'div-gpt-ad-1631125303402-0').addService(googletag.pubads()); googletag.pubads().enableSingleRequest(); googletag.enableServices(); }); --> googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('div-gpt-ad-1631125303402-0'); }); -->Mottley, who has identified energy security as a main element of the island’s development needs, made the comments during a panel discussion on Thursday, involving Managing Director of the IMF Kristalina Georgieva; Governor of the Eastern Caribbean Central Bank Timothy Antoine and Canada’s Minister of International Development Harjit Sajjan.
Pointing out that legislation seemed to be a hindrance to development of the sector, Mottley said it was her view that perhaps the time had come for major regulation changes for the renewable energy sector to get needed investment.
Her comments come amidst rising concerns over the island’s lack of energy security in the face of spiraling fuel prices and the fact that Barbados is behind on its renewable energy goals.
“We go for regulation as we must. Then when the regulation is not effective or it takes too long, it is a drag on the economy. Right now we are facing that with respect to renewable energy and getting the regulatory framework correct,” said Mottley.
“The Government is going to have to make some decisions whether we continue to allow a process that is too long and too complicated and in my view, too complex, for small states as well. Whether we allow that process to continue unabated or whether we recognise that there is a crisis upon us and if we don’t intervene and try the best thing according to transparent and fair precepts to allow us to advance, then we run the risk of ending up at our destination fully paralysed or not even alive. These are the hard decisions that we are going to have to take, in my view from where I sit,” she said.
“It is going to mean, and we saw it with the pandemic, and insisted that the Cabinet . . . that all contracts over $1 million that we put before the Parliament so that people can see, because we will have to do more expedited procurement in order to save ourselves, save our region and to save jobs. We will have to do in some instances, some broad policy directives instead of complex regulation, with renewable energy in particular,” she said.
Mottley told the panel, “We have been waiting for investments to be able to get started purely because we can’t get the FTC (Fair Trading Commission) to do and act fast enough with respect to issues relating to feed-in-tariffs. At the end of the day when the directive comes, what use is it going to be? You are going to hear that we have waited so long that we can’t access the panels or you can’t access this material because of the supply chain disruption.”
The FTC is in the process of coming up with new tariff rates for systems of a certain size.
Reminiscent of a campaign promise that she made, Mottley said it was time the country goes back to “a principle on a lot of things and what is the public interest we are trying to defend, what is the public mischief that we need to avoid, how does the technology help us to do it in a more efficient way”.
Mottley said: “I am prepared to lead from in front on these issues now, because it is clear to me that you cannot play shots on a sticky wicket with the atmosphere very moist as you would play when it is dry and arid. You can’t play pace the same way you play spin, and we now have to adjust our shots for this environment that regrettably is too much like the environment a century ago, but with the knowledge that we do know better and we can defend the core principles of what must be defended better. But we cannot play by rote because we will end up with a lot of casualties,” said Mottley.
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