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The Antonio Guiteras Thermal Power Plant, located in Matanzas, announced this Wednesday on its official Facebook page that the hydraulic test was successful and that the process of starting up to synchronize with the National Electric System (SEN) had begun.
The announcement, brief and lacking technical details, came just four days after the plant went offline again last Friday, only two days after being reconnected on May 28 following four days of repairs.
The breakdown that caused that last outage affected the economizer of the boiler, with more than 500 damaged tubes and between 1,000 and 1,200 welding seams necessary for a complete repair, as acknowledged by the director of the Electric Union (UNE).
A comprehensive repair of the economizer would take nearly a month; a complete overhaul of the plant would require 180 days, but the Guiteras has gone 16 years without receiving this type of intervention, since 2010.
So far in 2026, the plant has accumulated at least nine breakdowns and system outages, solidifying a pattern that Cubans know by heart: breakdown, patch, reconnection for one or two days, new breakdown.
The public reaction to the announcement was overwhelmingly skeptical.
The important thing is not the synchronization with the SEN; what matters is that it stays synchronized, wrote a user who identified themselves as a health professional and added that they attend to 25 patients daily who have to go home without therapy due to a lack of electricity.
Others bet on how long the plant would hold out this time. “If the Guiteras comes in today, Wednesday, it will surely go out on Thursday and rest on Friday until Sunday. It works 24 x 72 hours,” one commenter wryly noted.
It will last until the weekend because lately it's on the 2 days of work for 4 days of rest system, noted another.
As the announcement was being published, dozens of Cubans reported in the comments power outages lasting 30, 33, and even 36 consecutive hours in Santiago de Cuba, Sancti Spíritus, the Havana neighborhoods of 10 de Octubre and Playa, Matanzas, and Palmira.
"I have been throwing away food and yogurt that my 8-month-old son can't have for 2 days," wrote a mother. A Cuban shared that he has gone more than 20 nights without sleep due to electricity issues, having only two hours of power each day, resulting in everything he had in the refrigerator going to waste.
Skepticism also reached those who acknowledge the efforts of the workers but see the problem as structural.
"The problem is that a major repair is needed for months, but the situation doesn't allow it," warned a user, pointing out that if the plant is offline for months, "that's when we really won’t see electricity again."
"You can't patch up old clothes. Advice from the elders", summarized another, expressing the widespread skepticism among Cubans towards the outdated electrical plant and infrastructure in the country.
The national context exacerbates the situation: in May 2026, Cuba recorded a record deficit in generation of 2,153 MW during peak hours on May 13, and the national electrical system experienced a total outage lasting 29 hours and 29 minutes on March 16, 2026.
The regime attributes the crisis to the U.S. embargo, but the structural deterioration of plants like Guiteras —which has not received capital maintenance in 16 years— and the shortage of imported fuel are the causes that analysts and officials from UNE have publicly acknowledged.
It's like trying to bring a dead person back to life, stated a user in one of the most shared comments on the announcement.
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