Cuba’s Energy Crisis: A Systemic Breakdown

For many Cubans, the sudden stop of a fan is more than just an annoyance on a tropical island; it’s a daily reminder of a critical, nationwide problem. On an average day, the Cuban government can meet only 50 to 70 percent of its country’s electricity needs. On top of that, Cuba’s entire grid has collapsed four times in the last six months.

The problem stems from years of neglect of Cuba’s energy infrastructure, exacerbated by constrained access to foreign capital and a failure to adapt to new energy options. As a result, Cubans are experiencing a significant breakdown in basic services, such as the storage of fresh products, basic food preparation, public lighting, and access to businesses. This has forced citizens to take extraordinary measures, like cooking multiple meals at once and working by flashlight.

Cuba isn’t just in an energy crisis; the country’s grid sits on the verge of systemic failure. The National Electric System, most of which was built after 1959, hasn’t received the investment and maintenance it needs for 35 years—a consequence of Cuba’s complex political and economic history. If neglect continues, the island nation will pay the high price of further economic decline, and increased social and political instability.

How did my home country get here?

Cuba’s Energy Infrastructure Crisis

Cuba’s grid infrastructure is so weak that run-of-the-mill problems like transmission line failures and generator trips are causing widespread outages. The unexpected shutdown of the Antonio Guiteras oil-fired power plant started the total blackout in October 2024. Healthy grids should be able to detect and isolate these kinds of issues, and provide backup through built-in redundancies. But Cuba’s old protection systems couldn’t detect the faults, and there weren’t enough spinning reserves to compensate for the generation instability, making recovery impossible.

Underlying the blackouts are three systemic problems: years of inadequate investment, substandard fuel, and deferred maintenance. Cuba’s aging thermal power plants—the backbone of the system, nearly all of which run on crude oil or fuel oil—are becoming less reliable, and must operate well below capacity because of fuel shortages and corrosion. One of the biggest, the 330-megawatt Antonio Guiteras plant in Matanzas, often breaks down because there aren’t enough replacement parts to repair it. Other facilities have been hit with adverse events, such the 2022 fires at the Lidio Ramón Pérez (Felton) and Máximo Gómez (Mariel) thermal plants. During the first five months of 2025, only 34 percent of the capacity of all of Cuba’s power plants, based on 2023 numbers, was available on an average daily basis.

Cuba’s energy system also suffers from years of reliance on domestic, poor-quality heavy crude oil, which is corrosive because it’s high in sulfur. This has accelerated the wear and tear on boilers, turbines, and pipes in Cuba’s power plants, shortening their life spans and causing frequent and costly outages. Cuba has secured a substantial amount of oil from Venezuela since 2000 through a favorable agreement. But Venezuela’s continuous economic problems have made this outside oil source less reliable, with shipments dwindling in recent years.

To help compensate for power deficits, Cuba in 2019 started renting floating thermal power plants from other countries such as Turkey’s Karpowership. By 2023, eight of these kinds of ships were floating in Mariel Bay, Havana Bay, and Santiago de Cuba Bay. But their fate is now just another symptom of the crisis. The government had trouble paying the high leasing prices, so the ships’ operators withdrew from Cuba’s waters, taking hundreds of megawatts with them.

Cuba’s Renewable Energy Options

Heavy crude oil isn’t Cuba’s only resource; it has a wealth of untapped renewable energy options, including solar, wind, and potentially sugarcane biomass. But the transition to renewables has progressed slowly and somewhat haphazardly, despite ambitious goals set by the government.

Crucial renewable energy projects often get delayed due to bureaucratic hurdles and a lack of funding. The instability of the grid makes it more challenging to integrate large-scale renewable energy installations, as they require stable connections to function effectively. And while the country actively seeks solar energy, it’s overlooking its once-thriving sugar sector, and the biomass and ethanol resources that come with it.

The Cuban government’s puzzling decision to invest heavily in building expensive hotels and enhancing tourism infrastructure while neglecting necessary grid updates has also made the system more vulnerable. From 2010 and 2024, Cuba spent about 32 percent of total investment on tourism-related infrastructure, and only 12 percent on energy infrastructure, according to Cuba’s National Statistics Office.

Cuba’s economy is in a poor state due to the well-established inefficiencies of its economic model and U.S. sanctions that worsened under the first Trump administration and remain largely in place. As a result, the government lacks the necessary hard currency to import gasoline, acquire the spare parts it needs, access the latest technology, and attract significant foreign investment that is essential for upgrading its energy infrastructure.

Cuba’s Power Outages and Rationing Breeds Resentment

The Cuban government reacts to its severe deficit with striking public ceremony. Every morning, usually between 7:00 and 8:00, officials openly declare the anticipated electricity generation shortfall. Then, provincial leaders across the island painstakingly choose which of their communities will lose power and for how long—on average 19 hours, and some over 24 hours.

Daily electricity deficits in Cuba have averaged around 1600 MW in 2025, according to data compiled from daily press releases from Unión Eléctrica (UNE), the state-owned company responsible for Cuba’s electricity system, and news outlets. Data from Cuba’s four recent grid collapses were excluded.

Blackouts for these “interruptible circuits,” as provincial electrical companies refer to them, are supposed to rotate based on a schedule. But the actual electricity availability almost always falls short of the plan, so the rotation isn’t carried out as intended. And with certain services and businesses being prioritized for power, a disproportionate share of the outages falls on a portion of customers.

Havana, the capital, gets partly shielded from this, due to its political and economic importance. It’s a favoritism that understandably breeds resentment in other areas. But even in Havana, residents on interruptible circuits must contend with at least four hours of power outages every day—a situation that has worsened this year.

In both the city and the countryside, the power outages and prolonged uncertainty have altered basic services, economies, and daily life. Refrigerators lose their cooling power, ruining valuable food that was purchased at a high price. Businesses must close, resulting in lost revenue and productivity. Students struggle to study when their phone batteries are low, in part because they use their phones as flashlights. Some medical facilities have backup generators, but they’re not always operational due to a lack of spare parts. Internet connectivity has grown less reliable.

Cuba’s Recovery Plans

The Cuban administration has admitted that the situation is severe and has developed specific recovery plans. These include investing in thermal plant maintenance, adding new capacity, adding solar energy, and securing fuel supplies from abroad. However, progress is gradual and limited by the same problems that caused the crisis in the first place.

To fix the thermal units, it’s imperative to bring major electricity providers, such as Guiteras and Cienfuegos, back to a state where they can operate reliably again. However, this method is akin to patching up a dam that’s falling apart. Long-term improvements are more important than just repairs, but they require resources that aren’t currently available.

There are policies in place that encourage rooftop solar, which people commonly buy from other countries. Small solar parks are also being built; at the end of 2024 solar capacity reached 298 MW. Pilot projects for wind farms are underway.

Angel Rodriguez uses a transformer from an old television to charge a battery in preparation for blackouts at his home in the Bahia neighborhood of Havana on 26 May 2025.Ramon Espinosa/AP

But development lacks scale and speed. Large projects often struggle with financial constraints and inadequate planning. The government set a goal of deriving 37 percent of Cuba’s energy from renewable sources by 2030; so far they’ve reached only 3 percent.

Cuba is actively looking to partner internationally on energy initiatives. Agreements with Russia primarily focus on modernizing existing thermal facilities and possibly constructing new ones. Mexico and other allies have also helped by sending fuel supplies.

Talks with potential investors for green projects are moving forward, but the investment climate is quite tricky because of Cuba’s economic model and crisis, its history of defaults on payments to foreign companies, and U.S. sanctions. In partnership with China, Cuba is building up to 2,000 MW of solar capacity over more than 92 solar parks across the country. China already sent Cuba equipment for more than 100 MW of solar capacity through a different program. By January 2026, about 1,100 MW of this new capacity is expected to be operational, according to the Cuban government.

As the primary power grid fails, Cubans with resources are taking matters into their own hands, often in desperate ways. Businesses, hospitals, and wealthy families are installing gasoline and solar generators; the incessant noise from which has become part of the city’s soundscape. Some communities are working together to install solar and battery systems. For example, a farmers’ cooperative in Artemisa powers its processing and irrigation facilities this way. These examples show a critical, bottom-up change, but they’re few and far between because of prohibitive upfront costs.

Cuba’s people are suffering because the energy system is being pushed too far. And the comprehensive changes required for genuine, long-term recovery are currently beyond the island’s capabilities. The lights came back on after each major blackout, but the specter of the next one looms constantly.