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Prime Minister, Freundel Stuart, officially opens the Barbados National Oil Company Ltd’s green maintenance workshop at its Woodburn, St. Philip headquarters on Tuesday, as (immediate right of PM) Winton Gibbs, BNOCL General Manager, Senator Darcy??Boyce, Minister in the Prime Minister’s Office responsible for Energy and Tennyson Beckles, Deputy Chairman BNOCL looks on.?? (C.Pitt/BGIS)

Government is leading by example and has announced plans to retrofit all of its buildings and properties to make them more energy efficient and to generate electricity from solar power.

Prime Minister Freundel Stuart made this announcement recently, while addressing the official opening of the Barbados National Oil Company Limited’s (BNOCL) Green Maintenance Facility at Woodbourne, St. Philip.

He told the audience that government was in the process of preparing the necessary documentation to apply for a US $25 million loan from the Inter-American Development Bank to fund the programme.

Emphasising that government’s electricity bill was over $60 million, Mr. Stuart said the savings from this effort would "release resources either for saving, or for meeting some of the other critical social needs, such as providing nursery school education for our three-to five-year-old children in our nation". ??

He added: "This programme by government also represents a business opportunity for the BNOCL both to partner with others who bring skills, technology and financial resources to a joint venture arrangement and to provide services in the areas of energy efficiency, retrofit and solar power generation from government buildings."

In commending the oil company for setting-up such a facility, Mr. Stuart also urged other maintenance facilities in the government sector, or those who do major work for government, to emulate the BNOCL’s?? green maintenance workshop initiative.

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Prime??Minister, Freundel Stuart, is shown around the Barbados National Oil Company Ltd’s green maintenance workshop??by Kenneth Walcott, Project??Manager BNOCL on Tuesday, at the official opening. (C.Pitt/BGIS)

"The government’s push for retrofitting of the country’s buildings and the generation of electricity from renewable sources of energy, will also see the emergence of an industry of skilled persons, to execute the energy efficiency retrofits and maintenance thereof, and for persons to execute the projects for the generation of electricity from renewable energy sources and the maintenance of such systems," he surmised.

julie.wilson@barbados.gov.bb

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