Blackouts and water supply in Havana: The new challenge facing Cuba's Electric Union

Alfredo López Valdés, general director of the Unión Eléctrica de Cuba (UNE), is constantly facing dissatisfaction. At the center of citizen unrest due to power outages, the executive is now also being pointed out as responsible for the water supply issues.

"Since early in the morning, Ing. Alfredo López Valdés, General Director of Unión Eléctrica, along with workers from the Juan Ronda workshop, part of the Electrical Central Maintenance Company (EMCE) of our organization, are tirelessly working to resolve the malfunction in the transformer of Cuenca 3 of Aguas de la Habana, to improve the water supply to the capital," reported the state-owned company on its social media.

The explanations about the water shortage and the impacts on electricity supply are confusing and seem to respond to a communication strategy of the Cuban regime, which evades its responsibilities behind a false transparency of information, in an attempt to soften the impact of the collapse of essential public services.

Last Thursday, according to the company Aguas de La Habana, a blackout occurred that caused a malfunction in the facilities supplying water to the Cuban capital, and as a result, several municipalities stopped receiving the service.

The lack of electrical power caused a failure in the 78-inch pipe of Cuenca Sur and two others in the 1000 pipe of PAD, the state company explained, assuring that its workers were working "all afternoon, night, early morning, and dawn on-site until [they found] a solution."

At no point was it mentioned that the supposed blackout had caused the breakage of the “transformer of Cuenca 3 de Aguas de la Habana.” However, López Valdés went to the EMCE this Sunday to supervise the repair work of the mentioned transformer.

At the end of July, a blackout in the transmission lines feeding the Cuenca Sur supply well field destroyed the conduit and left half of Havana without water.

At that time, the company Aguas de La Habana explained that the lack of electrical flow had caused a sudden total interruption of pumping, which in turn had caused several "water hammer" incidents in the main pipeline of that source, leading to collapses in three areas.

It is hard to understand that water would cause "water hammer" in a pipeline through which no water is being pumped, as a power outage left a water pump without electricity. But this is how Aguas de La Habana explained it, placing the ultimate responsibility on the power cut.

At the beginning of September, the president of the Water and Sanitation Business Group, José Antonio Hernández Álvarez, acknowledged that the water supply is in a critical situation in Cuba but assured that the main problem is the continuous blackouts that cause failures in the pumping system.

Hernández Álvarez insisted that the crisis of the National Electro-Energetic System (SEN), with multiple breakdowns in the main thermoelectric plants, is one of the key factors exacerbating the water supply problem.

Power outages disrupt the operation of pumping equipment, and when the electrical service is restored, it can take up to four hours to pressurize the system and resume normal water distribution, the executive explained.

In other words, power outages cause both "water hammer" and "depressurize" the water pipes. The confusion from both state companies is consistent with the chaos reigning in the government of the so-called "continuity" of Miguel Díaz-Canel.

Currently, more than 600,000 Cubans have no access to drinking water. The situation is especially complex in Havana, where more than 130,000 people have been affected by this situation for days.

In recent days, residents of San Miguel del Padrón, desperate and indignant due to the lack of water for more than two weeks, went out to protest and blocked the streets of their neighborhoods.

Dozens of residents from the communities of La Rosita and Siboney gathered in the streets early in the evening in spontaneous demonstrations. On Calzada de Güines, the crowd, including children, stood in the way and blocked the passage of cars and buses.