Bordering on a collapse of the energy grid

“It’s a complex energy situation.” “The Cuban economy is going through a complex moment.” “The distribution of regulated products is maintained despite the complex situation.” “Agriculture is experiencing a complex situation.” “It’s a very complex financial situation.” 

What sector is saved from complexity? If we counted the number of times this is expressed, we would compete for a Guinness world record. And win.

The same in headlines as in the analyzes and comments of the experts, the hackneyed adjective intends, without thoroughly analyzing all its components (complex is an integrated whole), to soften the impact of the contents thus qualified in order to cushion the raw and harsh reality: a comprehensive crisis.

“Today we have an accumulated process of technological deterioration, which cannot be resolved in a short period of time,” said President Díaz-Canel, referring to the severe blackouts that Cuba is experiencing. (The quotation comes from Cubadebate, August 27.)

The crisis, in fact, is not new. Cuba has been kicking that can forward for years, an issue which Progreso Semanal / Weekly has written and published articles about for years. Here’s a example from our Progreso Weekly files.

An excerpt from the July 30, 2009, Correspondent’s Draft in Progreso Semanal:

• “The economic and financial situation that the country is experiencing clearly implies a tightening of the belt for Cubans. It’s already being felt. It is not only the drastic cut in the consumption of electricity and fuel, which translates into a perceptible decrease in the flow of public services, or the abundance of fans in the work centers where air conditioning systems are turned off for a good part of the work day.”

AUTHOR’S NOTE: On that date in 2009, 19 of the 20 electricity generating plants had been in operation for decades. The norm is 25. From that date to today, those 19 plants have experienced 12 more years of overexploitation. From 2009 to date, what percentage of the money invested in the country has been directed to the energy sector? It would also be useful to compare that investment with moneys destined for other sectors. The world runs along the rails of energy, whatever the source.

I continue with other fragments of the above mentioned Correspondent’s Draft:

• I start by telling you that during the meeting of the Economic Affairs Commission of the national parliament, Adel Izquierdo, First Deputy Minister of Economy, described the “economic-financial situation that the country faces as serious.”

It then adds:

• The Granma newspaper, in its Tuesday edition, reported that said official “supported the situation with indisputable facts and figures” and noted the causes of “the world crisis on our economy, in particular the significant reduction in income from exports and the restrictions to access sources of external financing.”

“We all know that it is extremely difficult for Cuba to access international sources of financing because of the blockade, but it is no less true that factors of an internal nature, some of them structural, are part of the crisis,” stated the Progreso Semanal article cited.

As readers will see, they are excerpts from a work published exactly 13 years, 1 month and a couple of days ago. The blackouts are now more severe and extended then even, affecting all sectors of life in the country: from the home to factories and service centers. Nothing escapes its tentacles.

We live at the border of an energy collapse that, together with the meager supply to cite two key, but not exclusive, elements, move citizens to protest.

Foresight duly focused on the causes, taking into account that the empire does not change or exchange, neither do we, but that is not the only explanation for our ills. Blaming everything on the empire can be dangerous for a society that, for the most part, lives in the grip of blackouts, lack of medicine, etc., and of future prospects…

Before concluding, I suggest refreshing, for at least a while, the overuse of the qualifier COMPLEX in the media marquees, since it would lead us to think that we need to graduate more psychiatrists and psychologists.