What you need to know about the power grid failure that plunged Cuba into darkness

HAVANA — Millions of people in Cuba were left without electricity for two days after the national energy grid was knocked out due to the failure of the island’s main power plants. The widespread power outage that swept the county was the worst in years.

Authorities managed to restore power to some people on Saturday, but it was unclear when power would be fully restored across the country.

Here are a few things to know:

About half of Cuba was plunged into darkness Thursday evening, followed by the entire island Friday morning after the Antonio Guiteras thermoelectric plant in Matanzas province, east of Havana, failed.

Even in a country accustomed for decades to frequent outages amid a series of economic crises, grid outage is unprecedented in modern times, aside from incidents involving powerful hurricanes, such as the one in 2022.

Even as Cuba worked to resolve electricity problems on Saturday, the country issued hurricane watches for the far eastern provinces of Guantanamo, Holguin and Las Tunas as a tropical storm moved through strengthened into Hurricane Oscar, the 10th hurricane of the 2024 Atlantic hurricane season.

Officials said the outage that began Thursday was due to increased demand from small and medium-sized businesses and residential air conditioners — up to 100,000 more units this year alone. They also pointed to breakdowns at old thermoelectric plants that have not been properly maintained due to a lack of hard currency due to U.S. sanctions, as well as a lack of fuel to operate some facilities.

While some households have spent up to eight hours a day without power this year due to grid instability, the current power outage is considered the worst Cuba has seen in years.

Officials said 1.64 gigawatts were out of service during peak hours, about half of the total demand at the time. The government implemented emergency measures to reduce demand, suspended classes, closed some public workplaces and canceled non-essential services.

Another major collapse occurred two years ago after Hurricane Ian, an intense Category 3 storm, damaged electrical installations and took days for the government to repair.

It is unclear how Cubans will react if the current outage continues or recurs.

But problems with the power grid have helped spark street protests several times in recent years, including large demonstrations in July 2021 that led to international criticism of the government for its harsh response. There were also smaller protests due to power outages in October 2022 and March this year.

Officials now say changes to electricity rates for small and medium-sized businesses, which have proliferated since they were first authorized by the communist government in 2021, are being considered.

Officials said state power company UNE was using distributed generation to power some areas of the island and a gas-fired thermoelectric plant was starting to operate.

Cuba gets its electricity from huge thermoelectric plants like Antonio Guiteras’s and a few smaller ones, which require crude oil to operate. The country produces about half of the crude needed, but must buy some of the rest on the international market, which can be difficult and expensive due to U.S. sanctions. It also depends on allies like Venezuela and Russia for cheaper fuel.

Authorities have been working since last year on a project to modernize the island’s electricity grid through the use of alternative energy sources. A project to build 31 solar power centers is underway and is expected to be completed next year.

“We place top priority on resolving this extremely sensitive energy contingency,” Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel wrote on X. “There will be no rest until its restoration.”

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