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The Situation in Cuba CAN Get Worse

In Cuba, we’re living through intense times, and the last two weeks have been in turbo mode.

HAVANA TIMES – On Wednesday, May 13, the Minister of Energy announced that the country had run out of diesel, that practically all the oil Russia had sent a few weeks earlier had been used up, that the main thermoelectric plants are in urgent need of deep repairs and are practically operating by miracle, and that the new photovoltaic parks do generate electricity, yes, but their power cannot be used at full capacity due to the fragile condition of the rest of the national electrical grid, which simply cannot absorb it.

While the Minister spoke, people on social media reacted immediately to his appearance—announced publicly beforehand in several official media outlets: (1) the Minister appeared clean-shaven for the first time in a long time, and (2) also for the first time, he spoke with such frankness and without metaphors about what is obviously a collapse.

A few hours after the Minister’s appearance, the eastern part of the system collapsed due to lack of power in the grid; operators at the national dispatch center managed to keep the western part of the country online, and within a relatively short time they restored operation of the system as a whole, though with the corresponding power deficit, which for several days has already exceeded two-thirds of total demand. That means more blackouts, which in many localities now exceed 20 hours a day.

On the very same night the........

© Havana Times