The bankrupt utility behind Puerto Rico's power crisis
SALINAS, Puerto Rico/NEW YORK (Reuters) - In the rural village of Salinas in southern Puerto Rico, frayed electric lines hanging from a utility pole blew in the breeze last week near the town square.
But the damage didn’t come from Hurricane Maria.
“Those wires were actually there before,” said Fermin Seda, 68, a Salinas resident who said he has grown accustomed to downed lines and power outages.
Two weeks after the storm plunged the island into a blackout, less than 10 percent of Puerto Rico’s 3.4 million people have seen power restored - and many will wait months.
Restoring the grid after the worst storm to hit here in nine decades would be a monumental task even for a well-run utility. It will be much harder for the chronically underfunded Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority (PREPA), which went bankrupt in July amid mounting maintenance problems, years-long battles with creditors, a shrinking workforce and frequent management turnover.
Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-puertorico-utility-specialreport/special-report-the-bankrupt-utility-behind-puerto-ricos-power-crisis-idUSKBN1C92B5
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