The Fair Trading Commission has decided that hearings on green energy company Renewstable Barbados’ bid for a renewable energy tariff and for confidentiality over parts of its submission will take place entirely through written submissions, effectively closing the process to the public, Barbados TODAY has learned.
In two procedural orders, the FTC directed the applicant, Renewstable Barbados (RSB), and the intervenors in the case that the proceedings would be conducted in writing only. The regulator also set a timetable for the submission of documents and requests for additional information.
RSB has applied for approval of the rate it wishes to charge the Barbados Light and Power Company for supplying clean energy to the national grid and has asked that certain proprietary or commercially sensitive data in its application be kept confidential. The $350m advanced hybrid renewable energy power plant, to be built at Harrow Plantation in St Philip, is expected to begin construction by March next year.
The power plant, jointly owned by Hydrogène de France (HDF Energy) (49 per cent) and Rubis Caribbean Holdings Inc. (51 per cent), will provide 24-hour electricity to the grid. Designed as a utility-scale green hydrogen project, it will combine several technologies, including hydrogen power, to supply uninterrupted renewable energy.
The plant’s solar photovoltaic component would produce 50MW — five times the capacity of BLPC’s 10MW Trent’s facility in St Lucy — making it the largest solar installation in Barbados.
A four-member commission panel, chaired by Senior Counsel Tammy Bryan and including Jerry Franklin, Jennivieve Maynard and Dr Ankie Scott-Joseph, has been appointed to determine the outcome. Parties opposing RSB’s confidentiality filing had until 4 p.m., Friday to submit objections.
Under Rule 13(7) of the commission’s procedures, an objection must “address the reasons why the party requires public disclosure of the document and why public disclosure would be in the public interest.” Renewstable Barbados will have until next Friday to respond to any objections.
The regulator added that further procedural directions “may be issued from time to time.”
A second procedural order, which concerns the tariff request itself, sets deadlines for parties wishing to submit affidavits supporting their position to do so by 4 p.m. next Thursday, with copies served on all parties. According to the FTC: “The applicant will be granted until 4 p.m., on Friday, November 7, 2025, to file affidavit(s) in response to those filed by a party. Interrogatories may be sent to the commission by the parties to be forwarded to the applicant no later than 4 p.m., on Thursday, October 30, 2025. The applicant will be given until 4 p.m., on Friday, November 7, 2025, to respond to the interrogatories. Responses must be served by the applicant to all parties.”
Requests for specific documents must also be sent to the commission by next Thursday. The order stated: “All reasonable requests will be forwarded by the commission to the applicant. The applicant shall have until 4 pm on Friday, November 7, 2025, to respond or to request that certain documents be treated as confidential.”
Strategic Adviser to the project, Aidan Rogers, said the two orders set out how the consultation process will continue and how the FTC will handle confidentiality concerns about the information included in the tariff submission.
“Basically, the confidentiality request is where an applicant for a tariff, as is with Renewstable, pretty much says to the FTC, pursuant to the Procedural Rules, in the Utilities Regulatory Procedural Act, that there is certain information in our application we would want them to treat confidentially, and not disclose,” Rogers said.
“What they did indicate to us is that they would make a decision in relation to that, but they would have issued a request for us to specifically outline what information we wanted to have treated as confidential, which we did; and basically, the procedural order they would have issued a week and a half ago is setting out two procedural orders.
“The first one is dealing in relation to that request for confidentiality, and it sets out the timelines by which the respondents would have to make submissions in relation to that request, also the timelines by which we are to respond to those responses that would have been coming from the intervenors in relation to that,” he explained.
“The second procedural order would relate to the substantive application that we would have submitted earlier this year for a tariff, where we would have had a consultative process virtually on September 18; and several of the persons who responded, the same intervenors who responded to the consultation paper that was issued by the commission, indicated that they wanted additional information,” he said.
Rogers noted that the FTC had established guidelines and timelines for additional questions, requests for documentation, and further evidence in response to the tariff application.
He said: “Those two procedural orders, what they really do is to set the guidelines, the procedural timelines that the parties have to follow. But it is really just furthering the consultation process. What we are now awaiting from the FTC is basically the decision on our request for confidentiality, and, obviously, the eventual decision in relation to our application for a tariff.”
Veteran utility intervenor Ricky Went submitted his response to the confidentiality request shortly before Friday’s 4 p.m., deadline.
emmanueljoseph@barbadostoday.bb
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