Puerto Rico Power Outages Persist, Tesla Responds

Yesterday, another power outage struck Puerto Rico and it persisted through until today. Outside of the Puerto Rican response, Elon Musk’s Tesla set up hundreds of batteries to help power affected communities.

Puerto Rican governor Ricardo Rossello ordered the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority (PREPA) to cancel its contract with a subcontractor who caused yesterday’s power outage. Apparently, the same subcontractor of Cobra Acquisitions was responsible for another power outage last week. All told, these power outages have left the entire island without power.

Obviously, Puerto Rico is in dire straits. In fact, San Juan Mayor Carmen Cruz said on Wednesday: “Our electrical system is weak, at best. Today’s blackout makes it painfully obvious that we are not yet ready for the coming hurricane season, which is only 43 days away.”

So, how will Puerto Rico solve their energy infrastructure crisis? The governor seems to think that the island needs to look toward alternative sources. “This incident denotes the need to transform PREPA into a cutting-edge, modern and robust corporation. This is another example of why Puerto Rico’s energy infrastructure needs to incorporate new forms of power,” the governor said of this most recent outage.

Elon Musk and Tesla tend to agree. According to Musk’s Twitter account, as of 4:22pm CST on Wednesday, Tesla had already begun delivering battery power at 622 locations in Puerto Rico. He also mentioned that they are working 24/7 to get hundreds of more locations powered by Tesla battery installations.

This response comes after talks between Tesla and the Puerto Rican government late last year.

Hopefully, Tesla’s initiative will spur additional alternative energy support. As Mayor Cruz mentioned, hurricane season is just around the corner. It is due to last hurricane season that Puerto Rico’s power is in this weakened state in the first place.