Cuba is facing immense problems for producing electricity.[1]
There are now fve Cuban thermoelectric plants not working: unit 3 of Renté, in Santiago de Cuba, unit 5 of the Nuevitas generating plant, unit 1 in Santa Cruz del Norte, unit 2 in Felton and unit 6 in Rente. In addition, there are 58 distributed generation engines stopped due to “fuel shortages.”
“This situation has occurred after months of promises from the authorities, who assured that blackouts would decrease during the summer and to do so they implemented an ambitious maintenance plan for thermoelectric plants that involved service cuts of up to more than 20 hours in some territories during part of March and April.”
“In mid-June, Jorge Piñón, director of the Energy Program for Latin America and the Caribbean at the University of Texas, warned DIARIO DE CUBA that “Cuban plants are beyond their useful life cycle, with more than 35 years of exploitation. That is why we have always said that there is no short-term patch solution. The total recapitalization of the system is the only solution, and Cuba does not have what it needs for that: time (three to five years) and money (five to eight billion dollars).”
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[1] August begins in Cuba with five thermoelectric plants in disarray and 24-hour blackouts, Diario de Duba (Aug. 1, 2024)
