The coordinator and supervisor Catalina Point, celso marranzini, revealed that thermoelectric this running by above 90% of its capacity, will not be privatized and will leave benefits to the State for about US$240 million this year.
Interviewed by the journalist Federico Méndez, in the program Esferas de Poder, which is broadcast on Sundays from 8:00 a.m. to 9:00 a.m., on RNN Channel 27, he maintained that Punta Catalina is sufficiently supplied with coal and will be generating at full capacity during the Christmas season.
“The plant is providing benefits to the Dominican State, I believe that it is the only government sector in terms of investment in the electricity sector that provides dividends, this year, by December 31, we will have delivered US$200 million in dividends to the Ministry of the Treasury,” he said.
Marranzini stated that the mandate he has from President Luis Abinader is that Punta Catalina will not be privatized because it remains 100% in the hands of the State and with good management.
“To those who say that it is going to be privatized, don’t worry, that is not the case, the instructions of the President of the Republic are very clear and our function is to manage, not sell,” he argued.
He indicated that the rest of these resources will be needed to make investments in the plant, including the installation of a laboratory and a workshop.
“We do not have subsidies, if we do not have the means to pay the payroll, buy spare parts and pay for coal, we simply have serious problems, we do not even have a line of credit in the Reserve Bank,” he argued.
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Operation of Punta Catalina
The former executive vice president of the CDEEE indicated that the company maintains its cash flow and has never been a burden for the State and, on the contrary, has been an investment.
He said the plant had some difficulties getting coal, amid the international fuel and transportation crisis, but it currently has its warehouses at full capacity in terms of supply.
“What’s more, today we have a ship pending unloading because we have a really full space because there are problems in one of the Colombian ports, because there is a strike, that is, we are going to spend a quiet Christmas and the beginning of the year 2023 generating at full capacity”, he stressed.
Marranzini explained that Punta Catalina provides almost 30% of the energy consumed in the country.
“Really, Punta Catalina is doing an excellent job, we have had to do some maintenance that for one reason or another has been delayed, these maintenances have already been done this year,” he added.
He said that the thermoelectric plant has been generating over 90% of its capacity. He recalled that at the beginning of this year there were some problems with the supply of coal, but they were overcome.
“The plant, like a large plant, a few years old, and it must be taken into account that a plant in three years has had three administrations, there are things pending,” he said.
He indicated that it ended in the middle of a political process that had a very good administrator, like Jaime Aristy Escuder, but the Canarian engineer came to fight with the consortium and the suppliers.
He maintained that the plant is becoming more stable every day and constitutes the basis of the electrical system of the Dominican Republic.
“Unfortunately, a message was sold that Punta Catalina solved the problem in the electricity sector, I always said that this was wrong, that Punta Catalina is an important addition to generation in the electricity system,” he said.
He observed that the electrical system is very complex and has transmission, distribution and hydroelectric power, and the part that corresponds to the energy infrastructure is fulfilling its role.
