Opposition Senator Jonathan Wehner has criticized the government over rising electricity costs, arguing that Antigua and Barbuda’s continued dependence on fossil fuels is the result of years of failed promises on renewable energy.
Speaking after the Antigua Public Utilities Authority (APUA) announced an increase in its fuel variation charge for May, Wehner said consumers are now paying the price for what he described as the administration’s failure to meaningfully transition to renewable energy sources.
“It is always sad when the people pay for a government’s failure to deliver on its promises,” the senator wrote in a social media post on Friday.
According to Wehner, the Antigua Barbuda Labour Party has promised since 2014 to substantially invest in renewable energy to reduce the impact of fluctuating global oil prices on the cost of living. However, he argued that little progress has been made over the past 12 years.
“As a result of this administration’s failure to deliver, citizens and residents must now suffer even higher cost of living due to the increase in APUA’s fuel variation charge,” he said.
The criticism follows reports that APUA increased the fuel variation charge by 70 cents per kilowatt hour for May, citing rising global fuel costs. The charge, introduced in July 2024, is adjusted periodically to reflect movements in international fuel prices tied to electricity generation.
Wehner said greater investment in solar, wind and other renewable energy projects could have reduced the country’s exposure to volatile oil prices and shielded consumers from higher electricity bills.
He also questioned the effectiveness of previous renewable energy initiatives, including government-supported solar programmes, and called for greater accountability and transparency regarding their impact.
The senator’s remarks come amid growing public concern over the rising cost of living and increasing utility expenses for households and businesses across Antigua and Barbuda.
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Yes, young fella, the ABLP are responsible for rising electricity prices in Antigua, the Caribbean and the entire world…
I heard people in the UK were very upset at the increase in their electric bills and were planning a demonstration at the Antigua and Barbuda High Commission in London since it was obviously the ABLP’s fault… Americans too are not happy with the increase in electricity prices and are calling on President Trump to take action against the Browne administration…
Youngster👶🏽, you have a lot to learn about how the world works…
A nice young man. Articulate, intelligent and well mannered. So although you are an opposition parliamentarian please do not criticize every single iota. Sometimes a bill can be good but needs some amendments, some clarification. Again you are a good talent, be circumspect. Guard your avenues. The sky is your limit!
We seem to thrive on maintaining monopolies even though they are harder and more expensive to sustain. Our over-reliance on these gas and diesel generators are forcing consumers to bear high utility costs. Expanding solar and wind energy helps to stabilize rates and protects households from global oil and gas shocks. Its full time government and (APUA) stop stifling consumers right to cheaper and more reliable power.
@The Youthful Ignorance, currently the Solar panels in Bethesda and airport are not used properly to even be called a solar power system. We have no batteries system for them to be useful even know batteries prices fell significantly as recently as 2012 from $500US per kilowatt hour to $120US per kWh.
Not only that because solar is obviously only produce only in the day a slightly more reliable mode is wind which also dropped in price like solar to help out green infrastructure we currently have parts of a wind turbine outside the stadium between it the race track and also sea methods that could have been used to reduce the reliant of diesel powerplant saving cost by reducing diesel import for it. Not saying it’s possible we had 100% green grid but a decent size to reduce diesel reliant with would have made stable rates or not lower them because obviously the power demand has increased especially with projects like RO plants since potworks. Been drying up.
Each country have their reasons for rising price for electricity mostly from global instability since they use oil since they refused to move to green in England and EU example from stuff Russia invasion of Ukraine and recently US-Israel attack on Iran, US comes from AI data centres more recently since they drastically increase power demand for areas making private power supplies increase rates for those areas.
Blaming rising electricity bills solely on government “inaction” toward renewable energy is a shallow argument. The reality is that the cost of renewable energy components solar panels, wind turbines, battery storage systems, and grid integration technology remains prohibitively high for small economies. A sustainable approach requires not just installation but long-term maintenance, replacement cycles, and financing structures that don’t cripple public budgets.
It is foolhardy to expect our government to march in lockstep with global superpowers on renewables when those very nations are now backtracking on renewable commitments. They have discovered firsthand the limitations, renewables are intermittent, storage is expensive, and scaling them to meet increasing annual electricity demand is restrictive. If the wealthiest economies with advanced technology are struggling to balance renewables with reliability, how realistic is it for a small island state to leap ahead without collapsing under the financial burden?
Therefore, rising bills are not simply the product of “inaction.” They are the consequence of global energy realities, where renewables are not yet capable of fully replacing fossil fuels at scale. To pretend otherwise is political theater, not economic truth.
Please note that I did not say his argument is invalid. In fact it is . I was just cautioning him for the future. I like him as a bright young Antigua. With youngsters like this if trained properly, our future looks bright. Our – meaning Antigua and Barbuda.
Blaming rising electricity bills solely on government “inaction” toward renewable energy is a shallow argument. The reality is that the cost of renewable energy components solar panels, wind turbines, battery storage systems, and grid integration technology remains prohibitively high for small economies. A sustainable approach requires not just installation but long term maintenance, replacement cycles, and financing structures that don’t cripple public budgets.
It is foolhardy to expect our government to march in lockstep with global superpowers on renewables when those very nations are now backtracking on renewable commitments. They have discovered firsthand the limitations, renewables are intermittent, storage is expensive, and scaling them to meet increasing annual electricity demand is restrictive. If the wealthiest economies with advanced technology are struggling to balance renewables with reliability, how realistic is it for a small island state to leap ahead without collapsing under the financial burden?
Therefore, rising bills are not simply the product of “inaction.” They are the consequence of global energy realities, where renewables are not yet capable of fully replacing fossil fuels at scale. To pretend otherwise is political theater, not economic truth.
This young Senator has hit the ground running. UPP’S future looks very bright.
Youthful Ignorance, the young nan made a very intelligent accessment of the present situation, and after many years of empty promises from the present administration. You guys are so caught up in political kool-aid drinking that you cannot see right from wrong. All the solar panels on the airport property that were suppose to be creating energy, just there without batteries to store the energy. I guess you are one of the useful idiots of the ABLP.
The Youthful Ignorance. It’s more than obvious that you have not understood what was expressed. If you really wanted to make a point, you should’ve made a challenge to his claim on the government statement.
This guy eyes…look like he is high…a k.a…serpent eyes.
Finally we are having some traction by this intelligent young man Mr whenner, but everyone is mistaken about this renewable energy business, Donald trump spoke the truth that it is a scam, all countries that has it still depends mainly in nuclear energy, the pressure we want to put on Africa for these resources to facilitate renewable energy is oblivious to us, you hear of war in the D.R congo, that’s the white foreign global corporation jockeying for dominance of Africa resources to manufacture these renewable energy products including batteries.
Now let look at Antigua situation, renewable energy is a scam among the politicians, they use it to obtain funding from foreign agencies.
If you notice the placement of these solar farm and the soon to becoming wind energy system placement are very flamboyantly done, instead of from any engineering perspective, the politicians are hoping that the visibility placements will give donors a compelling image to donate more monies, and that is unaccountable monies not entrusted to the treasury of Antigua and Barbuda unless the minister makes it available.
Can you imagine that some large wind turbine will be placed adjacent to the stadium in that calm windless area?
Back I’m the days during the late V.C Bird administration, they had a wind turbine on new Winthorpes hill where it has high wind, and now we have all these university graduates today look at the logistical failure of some engineers who decide to let the politicians take charge. Now to the solar farm where we learn that there was no battery procurement when there was a political fallout between the late Asot and Gaston.
These solar farm gives the unsuspecting public that they could actually power the island and that it will reduce their electricity bill, but that is far from the truth, these solar farm if equipped with battery will only benefit the private contractor that supplies APUA with power.
1. It stabilize the generation capacity during transients.
2. The APUA sign a contract to generate certain kilowatts hour of power monthly which has to be paid for whether they use it or not.
So if the people of this country is having the faintest idea that solar will reduce high electricity bill even if you put the solar to your house it is a lie. Because you will be estimated to keep that statutory corporation financially stable because they have overhead expenditures and salaries.
If all the houses in Antigua had solar panels it will create a power generation instability, it has to be regulated to apply loading to the generators in terms of cycle stability for instrumentation protection in terms and f voltage output on the grid.
The politicians are protecting the big private contract in place or else they do use the parliament to change the contract to pass on the savings to us if they set up a real renewable energy system, other environmental factors will be weather, sun and rain intensity varies so too is energy capacity output, so that’s why the fossil power generator or nuclear or steam or hydro will be ubiquitous.
But in any case for these incentives to be ever realized by the people of Antigua and Barbuda, there has to be real electrical engineers with autonomy to direct the politicians instead of the politicians using them to rubber stamp their political aspirations for the sake of extorting monies from donors for themselves when in office. That is the reason why a lot of square pegs in round holes and will always have professionals from abroad come in as a paternalistic figure in many fields be it engineering and look down on our university graduates in a condescending manner.
For me , I would not sit there with titles to my name on paper and lack the capacity because that job came because of family and political connections.
I will always admire this outstanding engineer Mr George Piggott.
These young engineer may be academic and just use it to apply title to their names but is this really their calling in life?
You know when making your argument in a vacuum you’ll be surprise when the rebuttal comes.
I wait and see how his first debate in parliament will end.
He needs to learn a lot about debating in public and debating in parliament with specific rules of disclosing your source. And not making unsupported statements. The leader of government business in the Senate will wipe the floor with him. Watch that debate coming.
@Lest We Forget, I guess you haven’t listened to him in the Youth parliament. He will not be used used to wipe the foot at all!!!!! Not this one!
@Inquire…ih bun yuh that you don’t have eyes like that?????? Lol
@Fitzroy Caesar, your understanding of green energy is significantly outdated, green energy is and been cheaper than fossil energy.
A internet search says it about $1 mil USD per megawatts for a solar power plant so taking into account we had projects like the tourist port for $60 mil, $100mil for roads or even were protecting 100mil EC surplus granted can’t be sure if the tax holidays were taken into account when the 2026 budget was announced it is definitely in our budget especially since maintenance cost is basic labour cost until the replacement that are needed 15-30 years after.
@Hazel Roberts, saying green businesses is a scam is a bit disingenuous in anyways yes solar only works in the day so anyone who is serious wouldn’t relay soly on solar realistically solar wind are the easiest like you say the contract with the powerplant would limit what can be don’t but since we don’t have the details publicly what can be safely assumed that there is min rate and an agreed rate to pay over that amount since power demand isn’t static and can/will over especially when it was originally signed and changed is expected to expire early 2030s so it may have conditions to have preparation for that but even having something to offset the overpay rate if there is one or at least prepare for when the deal expires in around 5 years.
I totally agree weather reliant shouldn’t be the only source it needs and should be coupled with a stable source like ocean then since we do not have traditional hydro source like a river to use there are mature and experimental technology, nuclear which has a stigma to that is main thing to overcome public perception, or advanced geothermal which just dig deeper to tap into the heat that radiate from the core so it doesn’t need to be into a geo hotspot but the issue with some of these some are more expensive to scale being the new technologies.
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