Why Can’t BEL Just Buy More Electricity? 

Belize is staring down a potential electricity shortfall within the next year, but even as Belize Electricity Limited (BEL) warns that available generation capacity is tightening, the utility cannot simply go out and buy more power.

BEL has requested an emergency declaration to allow it to secure additional generation, but that request must first make its way through Cabinet and the Public Utilities Commission (PUC).

Dr. Leroy Almendarez, CEO of the Ministry of Public Utilities, says the process is deliberately structured to prevent BEL from independently deciding who supplies the additional power. “We don’t want it to be said that BEL can just go out and determine that I want to get from X or Y. That is not what is happening,” Almendarez said. “BEL does not just go out and say, well I can see the emergency coming up and so I just go and do so. Don’t forget and this must always be at the back of our minds, that there is a regulator called the PUC.” 

If Cabinet approves the emergency declaration, the PUC would then issue an order authorising BEL to procure emergency generation.

Almendarez says the regulator remains central to the process. BEL, as the country’s single buyer, would first have to establish that there is an emergency and identify an entity capable of meeting the projected shortfall. Only then would negotiations take place.

The urgency comes as electricity demand continues to close in on Belize’s available generation capacity, which has raised concerns about the stability of the national grid.

For now, BEL’s request sits with the PUC for review. Almendarez says if the projected shortfall runs longer than currently expected, further rounds of engagement will likely follow.