Havana:
Cuba was plunged right into a nationwide blackout on Friday after the island’s largest energy plant failed, the power ministry stated, 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, advised state tv.
When the ability plant shut down, “the system collapsed,” he stated, including that the federal government was working to revive service as quickly as doable to the island’s 11 million folks.
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 with the intention to prioritize electrical energy provide to properties.
President Miguel Diaz-Canel stated Friday on social media platform X that the federal government would “not relaxation” till the lights had been again on and the power disaster resolved.
Worst disaster in 30 years
He blamed the scenario on Cuba’s difficulties in buying gasoline for its energy crops, which he attributed to the tightening of a six-decade-long US commerce embargo beneath 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, medication, gasoline and even water.
Whereas the authorities mainly blame the US embargo, the island can be nonetheless feeling the aftershocks of the Covid-19 pandemic, which hit tourism arduous.
The island’s electrical energy is generated by eight growing older thermal energy crops, a few of which have damaged down or are beneath upkeep, in addition to seven floating crops leased from Turkish corporations and a raft of turbines.
In 2022, the island suffered months of day by day hours-long energy outages, culminating in a nationwide blackout on September 27 that yr, brought on by Hurricane Ian.
The scenario eased in 2023 however in March this yr, upkeep work on the Antonio Guiteras plant, which is positioned about 100 kilometers (60 miles) from the capital, once more prompted rolling energy cuts.
(This story has not been edited by NDTV employees and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
