Trinidad and Tobago Electricity Commission

Trinidad and Tobago Electricity Commission (T&TEC) is the sole retailer of electricity in Trinidad and Tobago. It is responsible for the design, construction, operation and maintenance of the country's electrical transmission and distribution network. The utility supplies electric power to customers on both islands via a single interconnected grid. Electrical energy is widely been purchased, metered and feed into the national grid from independent power producers. These producers are the Power Generation Company of Trinidad and Tobago (PowerGen) giving a total of 1,344 MW, Trinity Power Ltd. giving 225 MW and Trinidad Generation Unlimited (TGU) giving 720MW. All power stations in Trinidad and Tobago are fueled by hydrocarbons.

T&TEC was formed in 1946 after the merger of independent companies. It supplies over a million residential, municipal, commercial and industrial customers.

In 2006, the United States-based Mirant Corporation, facing a severe financial situation, announced that part of Mirant's restructuring efforts includes the intent to sell off their part ownership of PowerGen. Following that announcement, the government of Trinidad and Tobago placed the overall structure of T&TEC and PowerGen under review for future possible amalgamation. The companies T&TEC, Mirant and BP currently owns 51%, 39% and 10% of the PowerGen company respectively.[1] Any possible termination of the Mirant (now Genon) stake is seen as opportunity to simplify the structure and relationship between the T&TEC and PowerGen companies.

In October 2009 the Cove Power Station owned by T&TEC and on the smaller island of Tobago was put into operation. This 64 MW natural gas or diesel power plant will reduce transmission losses on electric power transmission underground marine cables between the islands, in addition to upgrading bulk power to Tobago previously provided by T&TEC’s old 21 MW Scarborough Power Station which only used diesel fuel.