Related videos:
Directors of the thermal power plant Antonio Guiteras, located in Matanzas, announced this Thursday that they will initiate the startup of the unit tonight, as reported by the official journalist José Miguel Solís.
The engineer Elmer García Romero, technical deputy director of the plant, explained that after a hydraulic test lasting approximately six hours, only one weld remains to be completed and the radiological control of a leak detected in the boiler must be carried out before proceeding to ignition and synchronization with the National Electric System.
García specified that on this occasion, "the checks were deepened not only in the economizer, responsible for the recent failures, but a large number of heat exchange surfaces were also monitored."
However, Cubans, used to advertisements lasting longer than the actual functioning time of the unit block, have little faith in these "miraculous repairs."
Plant specialists noted that "the delay is due to doing things with science, precision, and foresight to avoid another block outage," referring to the history of failures that the facility has accumulated.
Solís himself acknowledged in his note that "the Guiteras will not be online during peak demand hours, as many desire," although he described the challenges overcome as something that "surpasses the most fertile imagination."
The announcement comes after the 14th outage of the National Electric System that Guiteras has experienced so far this year, which occurred last Friday, June 6, due to new leakages in the boiler, just three days after being synchronized on June 3.
The pattern repeats throughout 2026: promised starts followed by new breakdowns within days, which has generated growing skepticism among the population regarding the plant's actual ability to operate steadily.
La Guiteras is the largest power generation unit in Cuba, with a capacity of around 300 MW, and its chronic instability exacerbates an electrical crisis that is already considered the worst in the country's recent history.
The electricity deficit surpassed 2,000 MW this Thursday, with protests from Cubans banging pots in Havana.
On June 10, the Electric Union projected a nighttime deficit of 2,010 MW, with a demand of 3,000 MW and a availability of only 990 MW, while Cuba generates less than one-third of the electricity it needs.
On that same day, 106 distributed generation plants were out of service due to a lack of fuel, resulting in an additional loss of 890 MW.
In provinces like Granma, blackouts have lasted between 45 and 48 consecutive hours, a situation that reflects the structural collapse of an electrical system devastated by decades of underinvestment and mismanagement under the dictatorship.
Solís concluded his note with a phrase that encapsulates the uncertainty surrounding each new attempt: "If it stays on track for much longer, it will be a success and congratulations will pour in, but if, on the contrary, it fails, they will experience the pleasure of sacrifice and the likely ingratitude of men."
Filed under: