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Power utility Jamaica Public Service Company, JPS, is investing US$300 million to construct Jamaica’s largest solar power plant and a battery storage facility, starting this month.
The renewable energy facility will replace JPS’s aged Hunts Bay power plant in Kingston, which runs on fuel. The project encompasses 133 megawatts of solar energy and 171.5MW of battery storage.
The investment will be deployed over several years, “between 2025 and 2028,” said JPS Chairman Damian Obiglio in the company’s newly released annual report.
“This new capacity will transform how we generate and manage electricity, helping to usher in a new era of cleaner, greener energy.”
The project aligns with Jamaica renewable energy programme, which made seeks to generate half of the country’s energy from wind, solar or other renewables by 2030.
On its own, the proposed JPS solar plant aims to produce 2.5 times more energy than Paradise Park, which is currently the largest solar facility in Jamaica at 50MW capacity. Westmoreland-based Paradise Park was acquired by InterEnergy Group from Eight Rivers Energy Company, last month.
JPS owns the largest battery storage facility which generates up to 24.5MW of electricity. It cost the utility US$27 million to install in Hunts Bay in 2019. Storage facilities help stabilise the power fluctuations from renewable energy sources like solar and wind.
Its current US$300 million programme translates to around $48 billion in local currency.
JPS President and CEO Hugh Grant has “welcomed the government’s approval” of the power utility’s proposal to add battery and solar energy to the grid.
“Our investment in storage and renewables will be pivotal to the nation’s fuel diversification strategy, while ensuring sustained grid stability,” Grant said in the annual report, adding that it would “facilitate a reduction in dependency on imported fossil fuels, while enhancing national economic resilience”.
Jamaica’s energy grid comprises 789MW of capacity, 80 per cent of which is owned by the JPS. The utility purchases 168MW from independent power producers that are contracted to supply electricity to the national grid, JPS said last month in tender documents to suppliers.
As a monopoly distributor of electricity, JPS is the operator of Jamaica’s national energy grid. It manages and operates a transmission and distribution system that moves power across the country.
Grant indicated plans to upgrade that network with an “investment of US$108 million, or approximately J$17 billion”, in 2025, mostly for storm resilience. That’s slightly more than the annual average spend of US$80 million to US$100 million, Grant indicated.
“These proactive investments aim to reduce power disruptions, safeguard infrastructure integrity, and improve our system’s ability to withstand extreme weather events such as hurricanes and tropical storms,” he said in the annual report.
The company also plans to sell a section of its Old Harbour lands, a property listed as held for sale in its latest financial disclosures. The plan was initiated in July 2024, and the sale is expected to close by November 2025.
While JPS did not disclose details about the valuation of the property, financial records show a value of US$2.2 million for ‘reclassification of assets held for sale’.
Last year, JPS reported a nine per cent dip in profit to US$62 million on US$1 billion in revenue for 2024, with earnings impacted both by flat revenue and higher operational costs.
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