The Antonio Guiteras Thermoelectric Power Plant in Matanzas, the largest in Cuba, is finally up and running. The breakdown suffered last Saturday, which caused blackouts in many parts of the country, was solved this Thursday, reports the official press, “after an exhausting effort that lasted five days.”
“The irregular situation due to technical problems, both in the Guiteras and in other generating plants of the system, as well as the departure of other units due to scheduled maintenance actions, has resulted in annoying interruptions of the electrical service to the population,” acknowledges the newspaper Granma, who, with his usual voluntarist prose, described the news as an “encouraging announcement in the midst of the country’s complex energy panorama.”
Last Tuesday, and as the authorities had promised, the engineers they tried to connect the plant, but they did not succeed, nor did they on Wednesday. This coincided with the exit of the electrical system of the Máximo Gómez, of Mariel, which caused more cuts in the national service.
The newspaper ‘Granma’, with its usual voluntarist prose, described the news as “an encouraging announcement in the midst of the country’s complex energy panorama”
The Antonio Guiteras thermoelectric plant, in addition to being the largest electricity producer in Cuba, is considered by the authorities to be “the most efficient.” On March 17, the plant announced that it would be paralyzed for six days due to a “unexpected” failurewhich was attributed to a leak in the unit’s boiler and which not only affected generation capacity, but was also decisive for the drop in reserves.
At that time, as now, the Máximo Gómez thermoelectric plant had just left the system due to a fire and, in early April, there were breakdowns at the Felton, Holguín, and Diez de Octubre, Nuevitas, Camagüey plants.
With the patches carried out, always provisional, and summer at the doors, the population fears more months of intense heat with limitations in electrical current, essential for air conditioning to help alleviate high temperatures. These shortcomings, together with those of food and sanitary conditions, fueled the claims of many Cubans who, also tired of the lack of freedoms, took to the streets on July 11, 2021 in the largest anti-government protests on the island in decades.
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