After yesterday’s announcement that government working hours will be cut to save electricity, Nicolas Maduro tried to justify the measures in his weekly TV show by putting most (if not all) of the blame on sorry-ass consumers and especially on their overuse of Air Conditioning and TV sets. His response? Launching “a really nice PR campaign”…
See if you can detect the tension between these two recent news items: April 17th: In an interview with Barquisimeto newspaper El Impulso, Electrical Engineer Luis Vásquez Corro said that if there’s no rain in coming days (due to the El Niño phenomenon) Guri hydro-electric plant would be forced to shut down its turbines. Two days later,…
An excellent, alarming piece by César Batiz in Clímax highlights the coming gloom for Venezuelans: Guri, the country’s most important dam, is not getting enough water. The dry period is about to begin, and thermal plants do not have enough installed capacity available. After a reported $38 billion spent on revamping the country’s electricity generating sector (Derwick gets a…
In case you missed it, there was another nationwide blackout eleven days ago which caught Nicolas Maduro offguard right in the middle of a cadena broadcast. This new failure in the power grid wasn’t the only problem recently: the people of Maturin lost all electricity for almost an entire week thanks to “hurricane-like winds” that…
Way back in 2006, the comandante eterno launched a brand new mission: Energy Revolution (Misión Revolución Energética), which intended to promote “the efficient and rational use of electricity”. Even if the plan also included developing alternative sources of energy in the long term (and unsurprisingly that’s hasn’t gone well so far), its main priority was…
Last Holy Saturday was not “glorious” at all for people in several parts of the country, as electrical blackouts affected their holiday. In the states of Mérida, Táchira and Zulia the problem continued over the weekend. While parts of North Maracaibo were left in the dark on Easter Sunday night, the situation in the Andes…
Venezuela plunged into an electricity crisis in 2009, one that has seen an endless amount of blackouts and hundreds of promises from the government to fix the state-owned system. Last week brought a reminder that the issue is still serious, at least for those of us living in Western Venezuela. Two of the main power…
This picture recently posted online by Bloomberg’s correspondent in Venezuela Anatoly Kurmanaev is from the La Guajira wind farm in Northwest Venezuela (built as a joint venture with Argentina). It was inspected last April by no other than Nicolás Maduro himself. According to Kurmanaev, locals have told him that since Maduro’s visit no major works…
A super-massive blackout is currently hitting large chunks of Venezuela. Surprised? Probably not. But Nicolás Maduro sure is surprised. The President has gone to Twitter to call the event “strange” and “abrupt.” Rest assured, folks – he and our Armed Forces are taking care of the problem. Let’s just hope our obese generals let go…
Shortly after taking office as the new Electricity Minister, Jesse Chacón made a big pledge: he would resign from his post if his 100-day plan did not achieve its proposed goals. The 100 days have now ended (if weekends and holidays are included in the count) and it’s time to review if Chacón has delivered…
An excellent article from El Nacional on the high cost of building power plants in Venezuela. Because the government has basically sworn off procurement auctions, and instead resorts to buying stuff “from the rack,” corruption is rife. The money quote: “The general norm, says [industry expert] Aguilar, is for combined cycle plants to cost somehwere…
Electricity Minister Jesse Chacón said today that the government would raise electricity rates so that people who use too much electricity begin to pay more. This is a terrible idea. On the surface, Chacón’s idea would seem to make sense. The electricity sector is bankrupt, and part of the reason for this is that rates are…
New Electricity Minister Jesse Chacón has tried to differentiate himself from his predecessors during his first days at the job. He even pledged to quit if his new plan to fix the ongoing electricity crisis doesn’t work. But he also wants a radical change inside the national electric corporation (CORPOELEC), so days after its invervention…
As many of you, I watched Nicolás Maduro’s speech last night in awe. Not only was it a rambling, incoherent mess; it also made clear what everyone seems to be catching on to – that Maduro is insane. For me, the most galling part was when he blamed the opposition for causing the electricity crisis.…
Since the official annoucement of the “electrical war” last Thursday by Acting-(Like-a)-President Nicolás Maduro, things didn’t improve this weekend – to the point that some parts of Acarigua were in the dark last Sunday night when Mr. Maduro was in town. On Saturday, another major grid failure left several Southwestern states without electricity for a…
Caracas Chronicles 