Cuba is facing a critical situation in its electricity service due to a severe generation deficit, caused mainly by a lack of fuel that is keeping more than 1,000 MW out of service.
At this time, the impact on the country's electricity service is due to the deficit in generation capacity, as the electrical system has already been restored after the failure, engineer Lázaro Guerra Hernández, general director of Electricity at the Ministry of Energy and Mines (Minem), said exclusively to Granma.
He explained that generation remains low, mainly due to the lack of fuel, which is keeping more than 1,000 megawatts of distributed generation out of service, further aggravating the situation.
He said that today had been predicted to be one of the most complex days due to the shutdown of unit 1 at Felton and the planned total shutdown of Energas.
However, he explained, it was decided to postpone this total shutdown at the gas plants, which means that today all Energas engines will be online, contributing around 320 to 330 MW.
This measure also ensures the continuity of the gas supply sent to the capital as domestic fuel.
"The day will continue to be complex and the effects will persist," acknowledged the Director of Electricity at Minem.
Regarding Felton, he added that its shutdown will last for around 36 hours to resolve the reported fault, contributing more than 200 MW upon its return.
Félix Estrada Rodríguez, director of the National Load Dispatch Center, specified that at the time of writing, unit 6 at Mariel and machine 1 at Santa Cruz had already been synchronized, allowing the system to operate with an availability of 1,200 to 1,300 MW.
Regarding the cause of the SEN split on Wednesday morning, Guerra Hernández reiterated that it was due to a failure in the line connecting the Ernesto Guevara thermoelectric power plants in Santa Cruz and Antonio Guiteras in Matanzas, which caused a major imbalance in that area that could not be controlled.
