The overview of the national electricity system offered by the officials who attended the program this Wednesday Round table it’s catastrophic and, from what they said, it will continue to be so for many more months. The Minister of Energy and Mines, Liván Arronte Cruz, declared that maintaining it “is expensive” – installing a megawatt (MW) of new power, he explained, costs between one million and 1.6 million dollars – and that “it is not possible secure everything.”
After the intervention of the minister, Edier Guzmán Pacheco, director of Thermal Generation of the Electric Union of Cuba (UNE), explained which are the blocks or units that are out of service and how much it will cost to recover them. Adding the figures provided by the official, the amount would be between 245 and 265 million dollars.
Specifically, Guzmán Pacheco explained that the Island has “20 thermal blocks” of which only 16 are available. “We have lost four generating blocks and many of them due to large-scale breakdowns,” he said.
These lost units are blocks 6 and 7 of the Máximo Gómez Thermoelectric Power Plant (CTE), in Mariel; block 2 of the CTE Lidio Ramón Pérez, in Felton, in the Holguin municipality of Mayarí, and block 4 of the Diez de Octubre power plant, in Nuevitas (Camagüey), where, precisely, the latest protests against the government, last week, strongly repressed.
Adding the figures provided by the official, the amount would be between 245 and 265 million dollars.
In Mariel, unit 7 burned out on March 7, and the fire affected unit 6, which was only six months old. To reassemble turbine 7, Guzmán Pacheco acknowledged, “we do not have the financing”, between 90 and 100 million dollars, he specified.
Another fire, on July 8, was also what damaged unit 2 of Felton, for whose repair the Government has a budget of 55 million dollars. “We do not have that financing at this time,” the official repeated.
Felton is also undergoing complete maintenance, the authorities reported on the Cuban Television program, and the estimated time for his complete recovery will be, they said, “never less than a year.”
As for block 4 of Nuevitas, it would be the first to be ready, “in 40 days,” assured Guzmán Pacheco, despite the fact that at the same time he said that the “100 or 110 million euros” that the repair costs is “also an amount that we don’t have. “We are looking at financing options, looking for credit options that allow us to build this block,” he said.
If the 20 blocks were working, explained the director of the UNE, they would give a total of 2,608 MW to the electrical system. Without the four damaged, there are 2,042 MW. However, these are not constant either, “due to breakdowns and maintenance”.
Without the four damaged, there are 2,042 MW. However, these are not constant either, “due to breakdowns and maintenance”
As of yesterday, for example, block 2 of CTE Ernesto Guevara, in Santa Cruz del Norte (Mayabeque), was out of order, and block 3 of Antonio Maceo, known as Renté, in Santiago de Cuba, was “under maintenance”. and 1 from Felton.
Not surprisingly, considering this other figure provided in Round table: the Cuban thermal plant exceeds the average age of 35 years.
As usual, the officials once again blamed the US embargo for the situation. “Due to the financing limitations and the economic siege of the blockade, we cannot count on the continuous participation of technical assistance that allows us to assimilate this technology,” said Guzmán. Pacheco.
However, the lack of money to repair the thermoelectric plants, some of which, as they recognized, have not received maintenance for a decade, contrasts with the financing of the five-star hotels, whose construction does not stop.
According to architects’ estimates, the cost per room in a five-star hotel is 200,000 euros. In other words, an establishment like the Royalton Havanaof 250 rooms, would have had a construction cost of 50 million, and one of 100, of 20 million.
According to the controversial Tower K of El Vedado –also called “López-Calleja tower” because it was the work of the military conglomerate Gaesa, commanded, until his recent deathby the former son-in-law of Raúl Castro–, some specialists they have ventured their cost at a minimum of 200 million dollars, that is, almost the equivalent of the total investment needed to repair and update all the thermoelectric plants.
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