Speaking of which Energy crisis in Cuba is like making the injury worse. A situation that, month after month, week after week, shows no signs of ending and which, on the contrary, has become an endless problem, a catastrophic and paralyzing storm for the depressed economy and the population the population has declined and is aging.

Of the last few years, 2024 was the darkest. Despite the government’s successive plans to contain the crisis, long and constant power outages have plagued Cubans day and night, prompting constant criticism and also street protests.

Burdened by the age and over-exploitation of its power plants, chronic fuel shortages and the state’s financial inability to turn things around, the National Electric Power System (SEN) has seen its generation capacity decline and collapsed several times this year.

The situation, described for the National Assembly of Energy and Mines Minister Vicente de la O Levy is catastrophic. According to De la O, in 2024 the availability of the system reached “the lowest level since 2019”, in recent years 5 units have been lost – representing a third of demand – and distributed generation is producing only 37% of its capacity.

As if that were not enough, the electrical infrastructure suffered from the onslaught of powerful natural phenomena. Darkness prevailed in the affected areas and even across the country due to another general disruption caused by the winds Hurricane Rafael.

Faced with this overwhelming reality, the government has had to adjust its discourse, recognizing that an end to the blackouts is virtually impossible under the current circumstances and transferring its promise of possible improvement to medium and long-term plans with a forecast increase renewable energy.

On the threshold of 2025, the year in which authorities expect gradual progress in the country’s electricity supply situation – although they warnedit wouldn’t be immediate ― In Cuba proposes an approach to the events of the last 12 months in a sector recognized by the government as “strategic and sensitive”.

Cuba’s electrical energy system: The triggers of a crisis

A year full of blackouts

The blackouts have given Cubans no respite in 2024. Although the last days of last year and the first of this year brought a slight respite, the generation deficit began to grow rapidly since January, reaching unprecedented levels in the current crisis. Power outages of more than 1,000 MW occur daily, with sustained peaks of more than 1,500 and even record levels above 1,700 MW.

The figures have led not only to a large part of the country being shut down during peak demand periods, but also to longer power outages of 15 to 20 hours in a row in various parts of the island and increasing blackouts in Havana, which it has had in previous years suffered less. The situation has affected families and of course production and services, educational activities and cultural events; Life in Cuba in general.

In addition, the situation has not improved over the year, but has worsened. If in March the authorities confirmed “very tense” daysand in May there was talk of one “Emergency” situationafter one “extremely tense” August The deficit continued to escalate until it forced the government to do so declare an “energy emergency.” This was followed almost immediately by the first SEN connection interruption. After further slumps and negative records, things didn’t look any better in December.

Breakdowns and maintenance: the never-ending story

Failures at long-lived Cuban thermal power plants were commonplace in 2024. Something similar could be said of previous years, except that now these are the old units – almost all with a useful life of more than two or three decades and a high capital maintenance debt – accumulating greater exploitation in their iron armor, in addition to more and more scars, Repair after repair.

At this point, it would be pointless to count how many times the island’s thermal power plants have failed. In the past year, there was practically no day on which one – or even several – of the system did not fail due to malfunctions, while others were down for days, weeks or months due to planned or “urgent” maintenance work. Once reintegrated, they were taken out of the system sooner rather than later. Not to go too far: today they are the ones who do not generate electricity.

Adding to this epidemic of breakdowns and repairs affecting both the Guiteras and Felton and the more stable Cienfuegos blocks – both currently closed until 2025 – is the progressive deterioration the engines of decentralized generation, the retirement of most Turkish floating power plants due to lack of funding operations in the country and the increasingly unstable fuel supply.

Cuba’s electrical energy system: The triggers of a crisis

One, two and three collapses of the SEN

Just hours after Prime Minister Manuel Marrero declared an “energy emergency.” announced measures In order to cope with the situation – including the paralysis of all activities that are not “absolutely necessary” – the SEN has suffered its problems first collapse of the year. It was October 18th and an “unforeseen shutdown” of the Guiteras plant plunged the country into complete darkness.

It was not an unknown scenario, as a similar situation had occurred in September 2022, after Hurricane Ian. This time, after the first total shutdown – which lasted almost five days and was followed by further outages during the restoration work – there were two more general breakdowns within just two months, up to the day this summary is published: one, during Hurricane Rafaeland another, on December 4th.

However, authorities have hailed the restoration of the SEN after these events as a success and praised the speed with which it was achieved – particularly the last failure when restoration was achieved in one day –, these separations – and other partial ones like this from which Santiago de Cuba and Guantánamo suffered – highlight the fragility of the system and anticipate the possibility of new collapses. In addition, they leave consequences in networks and power plants.

As if things weren’t bad enough, then nature intervened

“A skinny dog ​​“Everything is fleas,” goes the well-known saying and the situation of the SEN in 2024 seems to confirm this. In one of the worst moments, when there was a complete failure for the first time this year, Hurricane Oscar attacked the eastern end of Cuba with unexpected ferocity, leaving more than 60,000 families in Guantanamo in the dark, along with casualties, flooding and damage to homes.

After According to the minister of the sector during the last parliamentary sessions, it took 15 days to restore service and repair the damage to the electricity infrastructure. However, these impacts pale in comparison to the destruction wrought by Hurricane Rafael two weeks later. More than a million customers remained without power in western Cuba, not counting the general blackout in the country due to another system collapse.

Flashazo: La Habana tras el azote de Rafael

More than 600 transformers, almost 2,500 poles and 6 high-voltage pylons were damaged by the hurricane in Havana, Mayabeque and especially Artemisa, where the recovery work had to be extended by about a month with brigades from all over the country.

To top it off, two strong ones earthquake As of November 10, more than 14,000 customers in Granma and Santiago de Cuba remained without power, although this effect at least did not last long.

A new (and controversial) decree

In view of the ongoing decline in electricity generation and the parallel increase in demand, the government has initially implemented a measure Increase in electricity tariffs for those who exceed 500 kW/h per month – a measure that, as Marrero admitted, did not have “the desired effect” – and Published at the end of November a controversial decree for the various economic actors.

The regulation that came into force before the end of the year justifies the obligation for existing public and private actors that are considered “large consumers”, as well as for new companies and investments, to cover part of their electricity consumption from renewable sources. In addition, it regulates the functioning of energy councils and opens the way for the declaration of “electrical emergencies” by authorities, an aspect that has caused the greatest controversy.

According to the Decree, this regulation can be declared when “due to the generation deficit, it is necessary to affect the electricity supply in a planned and sustained manner for more than 72 hours”. The above has been interpreted by many as the “legalization” of continuous power outages for three or more days in the country, which the government has denied.

However, apart from the measures and sanctions listed, doubts and ambiguities remain regarding the practical application of the regulation.

The Unión Eléctrica has been planning a “total capacity” for 72 hours

Looking at the sun and 2025

Given the current situation – for which they blame US sanctions primarily – the Cuban authorities have presented a plan to restore the SEN with a focus on renewable energy. Even if their contribution is almost 4% An ambitious program to build solar farms promises to change the meager number.

Along with a planned recovery in the generator sets and thermoelectric systems, the government plan calls for the installation of 92 photovoltaic solar parks by 2028, which would contribute a total of around 2,000 MW, as announced last March. Some of them are being built in synchronization in different areas of the island and 55 need to be synchronized by next year, which is expected to add more than 1,000 MW to the system, according to the sources official forecasts.

This is expected despite the fact that the minister of the sector admitted days ago that there had been delays in the arrival of components for this project, which he also attributed to the impact of the project Embargo/blockade. Despite this hurdle (which will probably be exacerbated by Donald Trump’s entry into the White House), the introduction of 30,000 photovoltaic systems with storage and other investments to reduce power outages has been announced for 2025, at least in theory.

Cuba claims to have been installing millions of megawatts of photovoltaics for a year

OnCuba staff