Unit 3 of Cienfuegos' Carlos Manuel de Céspedes Power Plant Exits National Grid

The Carlos Manuel de Céspedes Thermoelectric Plant's Unit 3, situated in Cienfuegos, was taken offline this past Saturday due to a malfunction with the air compressor switch, as reported by the Electric Union on its official Facebook page.

This breakdown comes at a particularly challenging time for the National Electric System (SEN), which started Saturday with a meager 1,000 MW available, against a demand of 2,890 MW, leaving 1,915 MW uncovered from the early hours of the day.

The Electric Union's report warns that the situation will worsen during the peak nighttime hours: an availability of 1,000 MW is expected against a demand of 3,250 MW, leading to a deficit of 2,250 MW and an estimated impact of 2,280 MW affecting Cienfuegos and the rest of the country.

On Friday, the electrical service was interrupted throughout the entire day, including overnight. The maximum recorded impact was 2,272 MW at 9:00 PM, according to the official report.

Alongside Cienfuegos' Unit 3, several other units within the SEN are out of operation: Units 5 and 6 of the Mariel CTE, Unit 2 of the Santa Cruz CTE, Unit 4 of the Cienfuegos CTE, Unit 2 of the Felton CTE, and Unit 6 of the Rente CTE are currently experiencing failures.

Units undergoing maintenance include Unit 3 of the Santa Cruz CTE, Unit 5 of the Nuevitas CTE, and Unit 5 of the Rente CTE. Thermal generation limitations total 402 MW.

The Cienfuegos plant, which began operations between 1978 and 1979 utilizing Japanese Hitachi technology, consists of two units of 158 MW each, culminating in a total capacity of 316 MW and contributing approximately 14% to the national thermal generation.

Unit 3 has a history of instability. Unit 4 of the Carlos Manuel de Céspedes exited the SEN in early July due to a failure in the generator's voltage regulator. This latest outage is another link in a chain of recurrent issues.

Nationally, the situation is equally dire. Cuba has experienced at least six total SEN collapses so far in 2026, with sustained structural deficits exceeding 2,000 MW.

On September 1, the first day of the school year, power outages simultaneously affected 70% of the country.

In August, the Electric Union itself warned that the period from September to December could be particularly severe due to the simultaneous occurrence of maintenance and breakdowns in multiple thermoelectric units. The recent Cienfuegos breakdown confirms that this prediction has become a reality.