Pablo Hernández Emphasizes Puerto Rico's Need For New Energy Sources As Climate Change Intensifies

4/3/2025

During a House Natural Resources Committee hearing on American energy on Wednesday, Del. Pablo José Hernández Rivera (D-PR) asked witnesses what would be the best strategy to bring cost efficient energy to Puerto Rico.

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Transcript

00:00I now recognize Mr. Hernandez for five minutes. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member.

00:07So I understand the fossil fuel industry is one of the major drivers behind the climate crisis

00:12and that climate change in turn is intensifying natural disasters by increasing the frequency

00:18and the severity of extreme weather events. Ms. Gibson, can you speak to the role that

00:23renewables can play in bolstering community energy resilience and supporting critical

00:28local infrastructure after such disasters? Absolutely. Renewables are more resilient,

00:35more reliable than fossils. During winter storm Yuri and winter storm Elliot,

00:41winter storm Elliot especially, wind produced four times the amount of energy than was originally

00:48anticipated and meanwhile fossils were completely offline and they were providing much needed power

00:54to people in desperate times. And you know I come from Puerto Rico and we have some of the

00:59highest electricity rates in the country partly because we rely on imported fossil fuels for

01:05energy. How could expanding renewable energy in disaster-prone areas reduce dependence on

01:10fragile fuel supply chains that can be disrupted by storms, wildfires or other disasters?

01:17It would increase reliability, resilience and quite frankly safety and security of the communities

01:22and people. And would you say that you know utility scale solar and battery installations

01:28are easier to scale up rapidly in response to energy crises than fossil fuel infrastructure?

01:36It's not me that would say that. It's the evidence in the empirical data, the writings on the wall.

01:40It's faster to deploy and it's cheaper. Right now Puerto Rico faces a shortage of close to 800

01:50megawatts. It's expected in the summer and you know I'll be very transparent. I'll take whatever

01:58I can find in terms of energy sources to prevent power outages in the summer even if we even if

02:03tomorrow we discover the dirtiest source of energy in the history of the world. Obviously it doesn't

02:08have to be that way. If we had to find a temporary solution to that generation problem, could

02:18renewables be an alternative given the ease of scaling them up quickly? Absolutely.

02:25Could you provide maybe more concrete examples as to how you could address a 700-800 megawatt

02:33shortage using renewables in a very short time frame? Well representative I'm not an engineer,

02:39but I'm sure that there are people smarter than me that could provide that answer to you. But I

02:44will say that again it's faster and cheaper period. That's what the evidence shows. Okay.

02:54Mr. Sweetenham, I think you were nodding in disagreement. I would love to hear your

02:57opinion. Well you do. My recommendation would be to get a gas turbine on a barge. In other words

03:04people who need power rapidly on the order of 800 megawatts and you could if you bring a gas turbine

03:11on a barge and use that you can hook right into the grid and that would be done. You'd use a floating

03:19gasification, a regasification floating vessel which is also easily leased.

03:25Puerto Rico, I think it's very interesting you mentioned that because the island communities are

03:30tougher for energy and it does make energy more expensive. The island of Kauai, if I might,

03:39committed to going to renewable energy and so they've gotten very close with lots of solar,

03:45but it's a very small system and it's taken up a lot of land for a small population in Kauai,

03:51but that would be an example to look at. But they did need to find a way to guarantee reliability

03:58and so they took their existing coal plant, shut off the coal burner, and replaced it with a

04:05biogen generator, but they haven't got that up and running yet so they're still using diesel,

04:10but that would be a way you could get dispatchable source with solar and storage,

04:16but it's a big project and so if you want to get 800 megawatts this summer,

04:21you just need to find a barge with a generator on it and fuel it with LNG.

04:27And I appreciate that. That is very helpful. That is something that we have heard and that I believe

04:31the administration is considering and like I said, I'm more interested in solving the problem

04:37right now than necessarily in the issue of energy. Now I have heard that the supply chains for

04:44natural gas turbines are also very backed up and it may take years to get the necessary equipment.

04:51Do you have something to say about these challenges? It is true that there's a

04:55backlog for new turbines for a permanent installation and a lot of those are being

05:01purchased for artificial intelligence funding, but there are companies that rent them so if you need

05:08800 megawatts this summer, that's what you're not going to be purchasing a permanent installation

05:12for that. Right, I appreciate your responses and thank you both. I yield back.

Pablo Hernández Emphasizes Puerto Rico's Need For New Energy Sources As Climate Change Intensifies

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