Havana:
Cuba was plunged right into a nationwide blackout on Friday after the island’s largest energy plant failed, the power ministry mentioned, approaching the heels of weeks of prolonged outages throughout the economically devastated nation.
“The system was left with out energy nationwide” after the sudden shutdown of the Antonio Guiteras energy plant, Lazaro Guerra, director normal of electrical energy on the Ministry of Vitality and Mines, informed state tv.
When the ability plant shut down, “the system collapsed,” he mentioned, including that the federal government was working to revive service as quickly as potential to the island’s 11 million individuals.
On Thursday, Prime Minister Manuel Marrero declared an “power emergency” after weeks of disruptions, which noticed some provinces with out energy for as much as 20 hours a day.
He suspended all non-essential public sector actions in an effort to prioritize electrical energy provide to properties.
President Miguel Diaz-Canel mentioned Friday on social media platform X that the federal government would “not relaxation” till the lights have been again on and the power disaster resolved.
Worst disaster in 30 years
He blamed the scenario on Cuba’s difficulties in buying gas for its energy vegetation, which he attributed to the tightening of a six-decade-long US commerce embargo below former president Donald Trump.
Cuba is within the throes of its worst financial disaster because the collapse of the Soviet Union within the early Nineteen Nineties, marked by sky-high inflation and shortages of meals, drugs, gas and even water.
Whereas the authorities mainly blame the US embargo, the island can also be nonetheless feeling the aftershocks of the Covid-19 pandemic, which hit tourism exhausting.
The island’s electrical energy is generated by eight getting older thermal energy vegetation, a few of which have damaged down or are below upkeep, in addition to seven floating vegetation leased from Turkish firms and a raft of turbines.
In 2022, the island suffered months of each day hours-long energy outages, culminating in a nationwide blackout on September 27 that yr, attributable to Hurricane Ian.
The scenario eased in 2023 however in March this yr, upkeep work on the Antonio Guiteras plant, which is situated about 100 kilometers (60 miles) from the capital, once more induced rolling energy cuts.
(This story has not been edited by EDNBOX workers and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)