Havana/It was not necessary for the Cuban Electrical Union (UNE) to say this Wednesday, in its usual forecast, that yesterday “the service was affected due to a deficit in generation capacity 24 hours a day.” The inhabitants of a third of the Island were able to see it in their flesh. For the second consecutive day, there were simultaneous blackouts in up to 30% of the country, the worst figure in just over a month and a half.
“I feel like if they prick me I won’t even bleed. They have blackouts on us, and last night I couldn’t even take a shower,” laments Idelia, a resident of San Antonio de los Baños, Artemisa. There, the blackout scheduled from three in the afternoon until eight at night ended up lasting until three thirty in the morning. “More than 12 hours without electricity, and with this heat, who can stand that. “How sad I have in my heart.”
The power outages have reached the José Martí International Airport in Havana. In Terminal 3 this Tuesday, tourists could be seen trying to relieve their hot flashes with fans or waving leaflets in front of their sweaty faces.
“I feel like if they prick me I won’t even bleed. They have blackouts on us, and last night I couldn’t even take a bath.”
Over the public address system, a female voice warned that the air conditioning was off “for maintenance,” but an airport employee assured 14ymedio that the real reason is an “orientation” coming from “above” to save electricity: “We turn it off about three days a week.” Half of the escalators were also stopped, as was one of the internal elevators.
In the capital, many neighborhoods also suffered power outages, even the areas that least tend to suffer them such as El Vedado or Centro Habana.
Residents of Holguín report to this newspaper mid-day blackouts and an intermittent connection. From Sancti Spíritus, they regret that this Tuesday their power was also cut off, despite not having scheduled blackouts these days. “Here we call the week when we don’t have a blackout Marianao week,” he explains to 14ymedio a resident of the city of Sancti Spiritus, referring to a report broadcast on official television that went viral in which, ironically, a neighbor interviewed said that “in Marianao we have everything.”
“It is no longer the breakages of thermoelectric plants or the fuel deficit that are the cause of martyrdom. Now the emphasis of the morning reports falls on the maintenance carried out in a few thermoelectric plants and in Energás to guarantee ‘better electrical service’ in the summer. Something like the poor family that wants to celebrate their daughter’s fifteenth party in style, and goes hungry for a few months and then gets fed up at the party, which lasts as long as a meringue at the door of a school,” he wrote in their networks this Wednesday Pedro de Jesús, resident in Fomento, Sancti Spíritus, in a long post denouncing the general situation on the Island.
The increase in demand for heat adds to the number of thermoelectric plants out of service
“Zero blackouts and more food,” could be read on the wall of a funeral home in San Antonio de Cabezas, in Unión de Reyes, Matanzas, according to journalist Mario José Pentón. On the walls of the building, as could be seen in several images, they had also written, in capital letters: “older people are the ones who should take to the streets” and “homeland and life.”
This Wednesday the scenario was repeated. With an availability of 2,310 megawatts (MW), a maximum demand of 3,050 MW was expected, which translates into a deficit of 740 MW and an impact of 810 MW during peak hours.
The increase in demand for heat adds to the number of thermoelectric plants (CTE) out of service. As the UNE recalled, unit 2 of the Felton is damaged, which also has its unit 1 under maintenance. Units 1 and 3 of the Santa Cruz CTE, 6 of Nuevitas and 8 of the Mariel CTE are also under maintenance. This is in addition to the 34 distributed generation plants stopped due to lack of fuel.
Tomorrow the UNE will publish its daily report again, but it would not be necessary. Cubans already know what the day has in store for them: blackouts and more blackouts.
