NASSAU, BAHAMAS- The Government of The Bahamas has rejected key assertions made by the Grand Bahama Chamber of Commerce regarding the potential acquisition of Grand Bahama Power Company, warning that the Chamber’s framing risks mischaracterising the purpose of national energy reform and distorting public understanding of the issue.
In a statement responding to the Chamber’s concerns, the Government acknowledged the Chamber’s role in representing Grand Bahama’s business community but said several of its claims fail to account for electricity’s role as essential national infrastructure rather than a conventional commercial enterprise.
According to the Government, electricity must be treated as a public safety, cost-of-living and economic competitiveness issue, not solely as a business decision driven by the ability of a private operator to recover all costs through customer rates. It argued that government responsibility extends to protecting the public from systemic risk, fuel price volatility and climate exposure while ensuring a reliable platform for growth.
The Government also rejected the Chamber’s implication that affordability and stability on Grand Bahama should wait until demand increases, calling that position an unsound policy foundation. Reliable and affordable power, it said, is a precondition for investment and population growth, not a benefit that follows them. Serious investors do not commit capital to jurisdictions with structurally high electricity costs, and families do not make long-term decisions based on the expectation that reliability will arrive later.
On the issue of economies of scale, the Government acknowledged the limitations faced by smaller markets but said those constraints strengthen the case for a coordinated national approach. Fragmented pricing and isolated planning, it said, create inequality and weaken national competitiveness, adding that it rejects any approach that normalises materially different burdens for Bahamians based solely on geography.
The Government further pushed back against the Chamber’s description of the national rate structure as “artificial,” stating that a national rate policy reflects a deliberate governance choice to avoid deepening inter-island disparities and to deliver essential services on equitable terms. It said this approach is not an accounting mechanism but a matter of national responsibility.
Addressing concerns that government action would shift losses to taxpayers without improving reliability, the statement said that claim is inconsistent with modern energy reform principles. Reliability and resilience, it argued, depend on system design and execution, including storm-hardened infrastructure, redundancy, smart protection systems, modern controls, real-time monitoring and disciplined capital planning. Ownership alone does not prevent outages; engineering does.
As evidence, the Government cited outcomes from New Providence’s $130 million Foundational Grid Upgrade Project, where independently verifiable year-end 2025 data shows a 45 percent reduction in outage frequency (SAIFI) and a 35 percent reduction in outage duration (SAIDI) when major weather events are included. On normal operating days, reliability improved by nearly 50 percent compared to historic performance, with modernization and automation preventing tens of thousands of customer interruptions. Energy reform through public-private partnerships and power purchase agreements has also resulted in commitments to invest $1 billion across the archipelago.
The Government said these results are directly relevant to Grand Bahama, arguing that hurricane exposure, reliance on expensive rental generation and the need for major system upgrades are reasons for decisive, technically grounded action rather than delay.
Its stated position is that Grand Bahama requires an energy solution focused on outcomes, including improved reliability, stronger resilience and a credible path to affordability and investment readiness. While acknowledging concerns around financial discipline, the Government said it will insist on cost control, value for money, transparent planning and measurable performance.
The Government said it remains committed to engagement but stressed that engagement must be anchored in the public interest. It rejected any national discussion premised on the inevitability of high costs, deferring reform until demand increases, or treating equity across islands as optional.
For stakeholders questioning the credibility or direction of the reform agenda, the Government pointed to the International Monetary Fund’s most recent assessments, which explicitly recognise and endorse The Bahamas’ energy reform programme as necessary, well-sequenced and central to economic resilience and fiscal sustainability.
The Government said it will continue pursuing energy solutions that are technically robust, fiscally responsible and aligned with national development and social fairness, reiterating that the benefits of reform must be shared across the country.
