Hoy newspaper reported that Smith & Enron Cogeneration has rejected that the government, in an interpretation of the contract, discount energy not served from its bills due to the company. Hoy published that the executive director of Smith & Enron, Luis H. Luzuriaga, on 5 August 1997, asked that the administrator of the CDE, engineer Temistocles Montas, intervene in their favor to stop the discounting. The CDE and Smith & Enron have differences as to what is owed. The Smith & Enron power plant that was installed in Puerto Plata, causing damage to the environment and even forcing the closing of the Bayside Hotel, has an installed capacity of 185 megawatts. The power plant has not been able to maintain a steady generation of energy at capacity since installation. The onerous contract signed by executives of the former Balaguer administration established that the company could bill for installed capacity and not energy supplied. Hoy reported that the CDE pays Smith & Enron 2.1116 cents of the dollar per kilowatt/hour per installed capacity and 0.8802 cents, fixed payments, per kilowatt/hour served. The dispute is in International Court of Arbitrage of the International Chamber of Commerce.
