Implementing Puerto Rico’s Energy Transformation

The briefing urges the Puerto Rican government to move from planning to action following the passage of Act 17, which sets a 100 percent renewable energy goal. It highlights the urgent need for new capacity in solar and battery storage to mitigate reliability risks caused by earthquake damage to the Costa Sur Power Plant and the legacy of Hurricane Maria. The author advocates for the expedited procurement of solar projects, the use of virtual power plant solutions to integrate existing distributed batteries, and the development of energy efficiency programs to reduce demand and lower costs for ratepayers.

• Puerto Rico's energy system faces an imminent risk of blackouts due to a reliability gap caused by earthquake damage to the Costa Sur Power Plant, particularly as seasonal air conditioning loads increase.
• To meet the renewable targets of Act 17 and ensure low-cost energy, major new capacity in solar and battery storage is required. PREPA's 'Energy System Modernization' plan specifically targets 2,400 megawatts of new solar and 920 megawatt hours of new battery energy storage by 2025.
• Grid reliability could be quickly improved by expediting legacy solar project contracts and implementing virtual power plant solutions to connect existing rooftop solar and battery systems to the island-wide grid.
• Energy efficiency programs are recommended as a high-value resource to reduce demand and help close the capacity gap created by the Costa Sur outage.

APA

RMI (2020). Implementing Puerto Rico’s Energy Transformation. https://rmi.org/resources/implementing-puerto-ricos-energy-transformation/

Chicago

RMI. Implementing Puerto Rico’s Energy Transformation. 2020. https://rmi.org/resources/implementing-puerto-ricos-energy-transformation/.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |author=RMI |title=Implementing Puerto Rico’s Energy Transformation |date=10 March 2020 |url=https://rmi.org/resources/implementing-puerto-ricos-energy-transformation/ |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{rmi2020implementing, author = {{RMI}}, title = {{Implementing Puerto Rico’s Energy Transformation}}, institution = {RMI}, year = {2020}, month = mar, url = {https://rmi.org/resources/implementing-puerto-ricos-energy-transformation/}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }