The head of Puerto Rico’s power authority stepped down Friday, amid mounting criticism over the agency’s handling of restoring power to the battered island after Hurricane Maria.
Ricardo Ramos, executive director of the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority (PREPA) submitted his resignation to the board and it was made effective Friday, Gov. Ricardo Rossello said in a statement.
A successor to Ramos was not named.
PREPA’s board will meet later on Friday to discuss a replacement for Ramos.
Two months after Hurricane Maria knocked out power to all of Puerto Rico, only about 50% of the island’s power has been restored.
San Juan momentarily lost power again on Wednesday, the same day the milestone announcement was made. The same main north-south transmission line that caused the outage had also failed and left San Juan in the dark last Thursday.
“The highest peak of generation that we have had is 50 percent. In this week, we had about three general blackouts in the island that kept San Juan in the dark for most of the week. That is totally unacceptable,” said Tomes Torres, executive director of the nonprofit Institute for Competitiveness and Sustainable Economy for Purity Rico.
Ramos was criticized for signing a $300 million contract with Whitefish Energy Holdings, a tiny Montana-based company that had just two employees when the hurricane touched down in Puerto Rico, knocking out roughly 80% of its transmission capabilities.
The utility company agreed to cancel the deal shortly after it was made amid public outcry over its legitimacy.
Cobra Acquisitions was awarded a $200 million contract to take over for Whitefish Energy.
U.S. Congressional committees and the island’s energy commission are investigating both contracts.
They are also examining PREPA’s response to the outage.
The embattled power authority had been hamstringed by years of underinvestment and turnover in management, forcing it deep into debt. It declared bankruptcy in July after it had incurred about $9 million in debt.
With News Wire Services
