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NorthAmOil COMMENTARY NorthAmOil
Austin, one of the complex’s key customers is the country’s largest thermal power plant (TPP), the 200-MW Antonio Guiteras facility in Matanzas.
Pinon told Al Jazeera on August 10 that if the Matanzas complex stopped functioning, Cuban authorities would lose the ability to deliver feed- stock to power stations – and not just to the Matanzas TPP but to other facilities as well. This will compound the problems that are already hampering operations at these stations, he said.
Pinon told Al Jazeera on August 10 that if the Matanzas complex stopped functioning, Cuban authorities would lose the ability to deliver feed- stock to power stations – and not just to the Matanzas TPP but to other facilities as well. This will compound the problems that are already hampering operations at these stations, he said.
“The problem with [electricity generation in Cuba] has not been the lack of fuel, but the plants are very old and have maintenance problems. Now they will also have a lack of fuel,” he said. “If they lose Matanzas, they lose the ability to supply the power plants.”
Problems had already arisen by Monday, August 9. On that day, Cuba’s Union of Electri- cal Workers revealed in social media posts that about 1,223 MW of the island state’s installed generating capacity was off line. It did so on the same day that that the Ministry of Mines and Energy announced that the Antonio Guiteras TPP had been disconnected from the national grid. Cuba’s Communist Party issued a similar announcement and explained that the fire was interfering with the plant’s water supply.
Policy change?
The situation is still developing, but it does seem clear that the fire is likely to exacerbate Cuba’s far-reaching energy shortages and economic problems.
With respect to energy, the country has not been able to meet local demand for electricity. Rolling blackouts are common, and TPPs are often unable to operate at optimum levels due to inadequate maintenance and the difficulty
paying for supplies of fuel, which have become far more expensive in recent months.
On the economic front, meanwhile, Cuba saw annual inflation rates reach 29% in the month of June, partly because of higher fuel costs but also because of the weakening of the national currency. The rise in prices has helped offset the 1.3% growth in GDP that the island state recorded in 2021 after two successive years of significant declines.
It is not yet clear how quickly Cuba author- ities will be able to recover from the fire at the Matanzas complex – or, indeed, whether it can recover without external assistance in its present condition.
As such, the island state is likely to experience no small amount of misery in the short term. Without Matanzas, it will be even less able to sup- ply its TPPs with enough fuel to meet demand, so electricity shortages are likely to become even more commonplace than they already are. And without electricity, Cuba’s economy will be less capable of functioning, and its people will suffer.
This suffering is sure to attract offers of assis- tance from friendly countries such as Mexico and Venezuela, both of which made significant material contributions to the firefighting effort at Matanzas, as well as some other states in the region and international humanitarian organisations.
But there is also a chance that it may lead the US government to chip away further at the sanc- tions imposed on Cuba. The sanctions regime was tightened under President Donald Trump, but some restrictions have been removed under Trump’s successor, the incumbent Joe Biden. Indeed, the Biden administration took steps in May of this year to facilitate travel, family reunification, technology access and remittance payments.
In the face of a spreading humanitarian crisis, officials in Washington – especially those who do not share the Trump administration’s animus against Cuba – may very well advocate for a pol- icy change.™
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