Gov. Albert Bryan Jr. urged residents to “bear with us” as outages continued across St. Thomas and St. John Monday, with repairs underway and a major contract tied to stabilizing the territory’s power system still pending.
Speaking at his weekly press briefing Monday, Bryan acknowledged the strain of the repeated blackouts and rotations, calling the past two weeks “absolutely hell” for residents, but said ongoing questions about declaring a state of emergency miss the core issue. He said such a declaration is typically used to unlock funding or bypass procurement, neither of which he believes is limiting the response at this stage.
Instead, Bryan said he directed WAPA to move forward with repairs and not delay work over cost concerns, telling officials to “give me the bill” and focus on fixing the system, with the government determining how to cover the cost as work progresses. He also indicated a preference to manage the response locally rather than triggering broader emergency mechanisms, particularly given uncertainty around federal response and timelines.
WAPA officials have said pressure has been building for months at the Randolph Harley Power Plant on St. Thomas, where multiple units have been offline, leaving the system with little room to absorb additional failures. Two of the plant’s largest legacy units — Unit 23 and Unit 27 — have been offline since May and December 2025, respectively, while Unit 15, installed in 1980 and well beyond its expected lifespan, had been carrying much of the load before its recent failure.
Over the past week, WAPA Chief Executive Officer Karl Knight shared Unit 15 had been running continuously since September, unable to come offline for routine maintenance without risking broader outages. When it failed earlier this month due to an electrical fault, it removed a key stabilizing component from the grid, leaving the system short of capacity and forcing rotational outages.
Knight said crews were able to bring the unit back online temporarily last week, but it failed again within roughly 24 hours due to a separate issue involving its automated voltage regulator. He noted that some of the components required to complete repairs are no longer manufactured, complicating efforts to source replacements and extending repair timelines.
He added in a call with the Source after the presser that parts for Unit 27 have already been ordered and are expected on island in early April, with installation projected to take about a week. Unit 23 remains in a longer repair cycle, with critical components sent off-island for specialized work.
Meanwhile, Bryan’s comments Monday also prompted questions about where that money would come from, particularly after he said the government would foot the cost for repairs. Asked how the bill would be covered, Bryan said he would not use funds tied to the Epstein settlements, instead pointing to existing funding sources and other options available to the government.
Interestingly, he also noted that WAPA is in a stronger financial position now than in previous years, suggesting the authority could be able to manage the costs itself, while leaving open the possibility of working with the Legislature if additional support is needed.
At the same time, Bryan emphasized that the situation does not rise to the level of an emergency requiring special funding mechanisms, reiterating that resources exist and that the focus is on getting the work done.
When asked after the briefing why the outages persist if WAPA has the money, Knight said one of the primary constraints is time. He noted that parts for key units have already been ordered and are in process, but must be fabricated, shipped, and installed before they can bring additional capacity back online.
Knight said restoring the system is not immediate, even once parts arrive. When units trip, the grid must be brought back in stages, with generators restarted in sequence — a process that can take hours and is further complicated when other units fail to come online as expected.
He added that while the authority is addressing immediate repairs, it is also looking more broadly at system needs, including deferred maintenance across multiple units, which the government’s money could be used to address instead — or expedited shipping costs. Knight said WAPA is compiling cost estimates for that wider scope of work, which he expects to have within 24 to 48 hours, to also include the cost of a “new generator off the shelf.”
Running parallel to those repairs is the long-anticipated replacement of WAPA’s aging generation, a process that formally began in December when the V.I. Public Finance Authority selected Puerto Rico-based RG Engineering to lead design and pre-construction work for the territory’s power plants.
At the time, officials described the effort as a FEMA-funded “prudent replacement” of both the Randolph Harley Plant on St. Thomas and the Richmond Plant on St. Croix — a project expected to total more than $300 million. RG Engineering’s initial contracts for design and pre-construction services were valued at just under $7 million for each site, part of a progressive design-build approach intended to move the projects forward while final scopes and costs are refined.
According to the Office of Disaster Recovery, the solicitation drew multiple bids, but RG Engineering was selected in part for its familiarity with the territory and its ability to navigate permitting and construction challenges unique to the islands. Officials said the approach would allow work to advance in phases, rather than waiting for full design completion before mobilizing.
But while that selection marked a key step forward, the broader contract needed to move the project into execution — including the installation of temporary generation — has not yet been finalized.
At last week’s press briefing, Knight said WAPA and the Public Finance Authority are “tantalizingly close” to executing the next phase of the agreement, which would allow the Authority to begin deploying temporary generation while longer-term replacements are built. However, as of Monday, the Source was unable to determine a firm timeline for when the contract would be signed or what the holdup is at this point.
The delay is significant because temporary generation is built into that larger agreement. Knight said WAPA could pursue temporary power separately, but doing so would require launching a new procurement process — something the authority has opted not to do given how close negotiations are to completion.
That leaves WAPA managing outages while waiting on two parallel tracks: the arrival of parts needed to restore existing units, and the execution of a contract that would bring additional generation online. Asked Monday if this means residents are waiting another three months for a more stable grid, Bryan said he is hoping to see improvements as soon as Tuesday, but more realistically by the end of the week — adding, “this is just ridiculous now.”
Bryan also added that the situation reflects years of deferred maintenance now converging at once, requiring the territory to address multiple failures simultaneously. He pointed to broader investments already underway — including solar projects, battery storage, and the replacement of aging infrastructure — but acknowledged those efforts are also part of a longer timeline.
Addressing questions about whether a presidential disaster declaration or local emergency order could provide relief to residents affected by the outages, including those who have lost groceries or rely on power for medical needs, Bryan added that such mechanisms would offer limited direct assistance in this case. He noted that federal disaster declarations are typically tied to large-scale natural disasters and may not result in immediate or guaranteed support.
At the local level, he said some assistance is already being explored. The Human Services Department is working to provide relief through existing programs, including the potential reissuance of food assistance benefits for eligible residents affected by extended outages. But Bryan said broader compensation for losses, such as spoiled food, is not something a state of emergency would automatically provide.
Meanwhile, an extended outage that began around 8 p.m. Sunday lasted through early Monday afternoon before power was restored, only to go out again briefly around 3:30 p.m. WAPA said service was fully restored by about 5:15 p.m., attributing the disruptions in part to two Wartsila units that had gone offline within the previous 24 hours.
