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Cuba woke up this Monday plunged into darkness after a new total disconnection of the National Electric Power System (SEN).
The state-owned company Unión Eléctrica (UNE) confirmed the collapse through its social media with a brief statement: "A total disconnection of the National Electroenergy System is occurring. The causes are under investigation. Further information will be provided."
What makes this collapse even more unsettling is that, according to the brief statement from the UNE itself, there were no failures in the thermal units that were operational at the time of the blackout, leaving the technical origin of the event unexplained.
This is the seventh total blackout of the SEN in the last 18 months, and it occurs in the worst energy context in the recent history of the island.
For this Monday, the forecasted deficit was between 2,200 and 2,230 MW, with a availability of only 1,000 MW against a demand of 3,100 MW.
The day before, on Sunday, the maximum impact had reached 2,201 MW at 10 PM, a record that the UNE had already warned would be repeated or exceeded.
Among the structural causes of the collapse are multiple thermal units out of service: units 6 and 8 of the Máximo Gómez Thermal Power Plant (CTE) in Mariel, unit 1 of the Antonio Guiteras Thermal Power Plant in Matanzas—which has recorded 17 system outages so far in 2026 and has not received major maintenance since 2010—and unit 6 of the Diez de Octubre Thermal Power Plant in Nuevitas.
In addition, 106 distributed generation plants were offline due to a lack of fuel, representing 890 MW that were unavailable.
Cuba has gone more than three months without receiving oil shipments, operating with solar energy, natural gas, and thermoelectric plants under precarious conditions.
The 54 photovoltaic solar parks in the country generated 4,679 MWh on Sunday, with a maximum output of 709 MW, a figure insufficient to cover the accumulated deficit.
The collapse this Monday is not an isolated incident.
On July 4th, the province of Granma was completely disconnected from the National Electric System (SEN) following a sudden frequency drop while the Lidio Ramón Pérez power plant was attempting to synchronize with the system.
The longest total blackout of the current cycle occurred on March 16, 2026, lasting for 29 hours and 29 minutes.
The crisis has overwhelmed the patience of the population. In Havana and Santiago de Cuba,cacerolazos and spontaneous protests have been met with police operations.
In some areas of Matanzas, power outages have lasted up to 87 consecutive hours, while in Havana, the average is 15 hours a day without electricity.
The process of recovery after a total disconnection is technically complex and can take several days, as it requires the establishment of regional microsystems before the large thermoelectric plants can be reconnected.
The UNE did not provide an estimated timeframe for the restoration of service.
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