The fuel delivery by PVT Clara will slightly alleviate the crisis on the island, but it will not be enough to solve the country's serious energy situation.
This Wednesday, October 2, a tanker loaded with fuel from Russia will dock in Havana Bay, just at a critical moment for the island, which is facing daily power cuts of up to 20 hours and an acute shortage of fuel for electricity production.
According to satellite tracking by maritime surveillance platforms carried out by Diario de Cuba , the Panama-flagged PVT Clara will arrive in the Cuban capital after departing from the port of Svetly, in Kaliningrad, on September 14. The ship, with a cargo capacity of 20,831 tons, is one of several vessels used by Russia to transport fuels, due to the sanctions imposed by the West following the invasion of Ukraine.
Although the fuel shipment by the PVT Clara will slightly alleviate the crisis on the island, it will not be enough to resolve the serious energy situation the country is experiencing.
The Minister of Energy and Mines, Vicente de la O Levy, recently explained that "in the current conditions of the restricted economy in Cuba, 3,000 tons of hydrocarbons are consumed daily, which means that a 20,000-ton ship is enough for a week." In addition, he stressed that "two or three ships are needed each week to supply diesel, gasoline, liquefied gas, fuel oil and turbofuel."
So far this year, Cuba has received only sporadic shipments of oil from Russia, despite announced agreements with state-owned Rosneft for stable supplies. However, these agreements have not materialized due to difficulties in negotiating a payment method.
Jorge Piñón, director of the Energy Program for Latin America and the Caribbean at the University of Texas, told Diario de Cuba that between August 25 and September 19, the island received few fuel shipments.
Piñón suggested that the delay in unloading ships could be due to problems with "credit lines or a lack of liquidity," which would prevent companies from unloading fuel without prior payment. In addition, he pointed to possible "technical problems in refineries" that could prevent the processing of crude oil.
The fuel deficit has seriously affected electricity production in Cuba. The Public Electricity Union (UNE) reported that this Wednesday there will be a maximum deficit of more than 1,200 MW during the so-called peak hours.
Currently, power cuts are affecting all provinces (although they are worse outside Havana ) and have reached up to 20 hours a day.
In May of this year, Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel said the country would experience "prolonged" power outages through June due to maintenance work on the energy system. This measure, according to authorities, is aimed at reducing interruptions during the months of July and August, when consumption is higher.
“We are going to have extended maintenance until June to minimize the inconvenience of power outages in the summer, especially in July and August,” Díaz-Canel said in the sixth episode of his podcast Desde la Presidencia. The president made it clear that the total absence of outages cannot be guaranteed: “We cannot commit that there will be no outages. Due to the current conditions of the system, such a compromise is not possible now,” he said.
For his part, the Minister of Energy and Mines, Vicente de la Ó Levy, recently admitted that August was an "extremely tense" month, but assured that the government was still looking for "solutions."
The blackouts further complicate the country's already tense energy situation. Power outages are affecting all provinces, lasting up to 10 hours a day, including in Havana , where "scheduled" blackouts are implemented by neighborhood, lasting about eight hours.
These blackouts not only deteriorate the economic performance of Cuba, which has been mired in a serious crisis for years, but have also been the trigger for anti-government protests. The most notable occurred on July 11, 2021 , the largest in decades, and more recently on March 17 in Santiago de Cuba and other places.
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