Belize Continues Efforts for Energy Independence Amid Continued Reliance on Mexican Electricity

Belize continues to feel the effects of its dependence on Mexico for electricity, with about forty percent of the country’s power currently being purchased from Mexico’s state-owned electricity company, CFE.  The challenge arises whenever electricity demand increases in the neighbouring state of Quintana Roo. During those periods, CFE reduces the amount of power supplied to Belize, forcing Belize Electricity Limited to carry out load shedding. This means temporarily cutting electricity in different areas to prevent the national grid from becoming unstable.  Those supply reductions have resulted in power outages across parts of Belize, highlighting the risks of relying heavily on another country to meet local energy needs.  Minister of Public Utilities, Logistics and Energy Michel Chebat says the Government recognizes the need for Belize to become more energy independent. However, he explained that reaching that goal will require major investments and cannot be achieved overnight.

Michel Chebat, Minister of Public Utilities: “We are in continuous discussion with CFE. The situation is that they themselves have shortages in Mexico and so when they experience it then here in Belize we have to load shed, right? And so that is where we are but for us as a country it is important for us to find local means of energy production. A couple days, actually Wednesday, we had a meeting with the government, the IPPs, the PUC and BEL, so that jointly we can find a solution. There is a certain gap that we’re trying to fill and so we felt that it is important to bring in our local producers so that we can have energy being created here at home and to try and lessen that dependence we have on CFE.”

The Government has been examining ways to increase local power generation and diversify the country’s energy sources. The objective is to ensure that Belize can produce more of the electricity it consumes and reduce the likelihood of local outages whenever Mexico faces its own supply pressures.