Cuba Restores Power After 29-Hour Blackout Amid U.S. Oil Blockade

HAVANA, March 17 (Reuters) – Cuba reconnected its power grid on Tuesday and commissioned its largest oil-fired power plant, energy officials said, ending a nationwide power outage that lasted more than 29 hours as the United States moved to cut off the island’s fuel supply.

The Caribbean island’s national power grid was fully back online at 18:11 (2211 GMT) after the country’s 10 million people were plunged into darkness overnight. However, officials said that power outages may continue because not enough electricity is produced.

In addition to cutting oil sales to Cuba, US President Donald Trump stepped up his rhetoric towards the Communist-run island on Monday, saying he could do anything he wanted with the country.

A US State Department official blamed the Cuban government for the grid collapse and called the power outages “a symptom of the failed regime’s incompetence.”

Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel hit back at Washington and criticized its “almost daily public threats against Cuba.”

“They are planning and have announced their plans to take over the country, its resources, its properties and even the economy they are trying to strangle to force us to surrender,” Diaz-Canel wrote on social media Tuesday night, shortly after power was restored across the country.

Cuba has not yet said what caused Monday’s nationwide grid failure; It was the first collapse since the United States cut off Cuba’s oil supplies from Venezuela and threatened to impose tariffs on countries sending fuel to the island nation.

At noon Tuesday, grid workers successfully fired up the Antonio Guiteras power plant, a decades-old behemoth that supports the nation’s power grid.

Electricity production, hampered by severe fuel shortages and aging power plants, is still far below what is needed to meet demand, providing scant relief for Cubans already exhausted by months of power outages.

Many Cubans, including those in the capital Havana, were experiencing power outages of 16 hours or more a day even before the latest grid collapse.

“It affects every aspect of our lives,” said Havana resident Carlos Montes de Oca, noting that the outages have shattered simple needs such as food and water supplies. “The only thing we can do is sit and wait, read a book… Otherwise, stress will shake you.”

Much of Cuba was overcast Monday afternoon as a cold wave approached the island, casting shadows on solar parks that account for a third or more of the daytime generation.

Cuba has accepted only two small ships importing oil this year, according to LSEG ship tracking data seen by Reuters on Monday. On Tuesday, a Hong Kong-flagged tanker capable of carrying fuel to Cuba resumed its voyage in the Atlantic Ocean after suspending its route weeks ago, according to LSEG ship tracking data.

Cuba and the United States have opened talks aimed at defusing what is one of the most severe crises since 1959, when Fidel Castro removed a U.S. ally from power on the island.

Neither side provided details of ongoing negotiations, although Trump portrayed Cuba as desperate to reach a deal.

He told reporters in the Oval Office on Tuesday that Washington would do “something with Cuba” very soon.

Monday’s grid collapse overshadowed Cuba’s invitation to Cuban Americans and other exiles living abroad to invest and own businesses on the island, an apparent goodwill gesture amid talks.

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio told reporters on Tuesday that such measures are not enough.

“Cuba has an economy that doesn’t work and a political and administrative system that it can’t fix. So they need to change dramatically,” he said.

Havana has said it is willing to negotiate on equal terms with Washington, but the talks will not include the “internal affairs” of either country.

Ordinary Cubans, no strangers to hardship, saw little choice but to remain calm.

“There’s still no electricity in my house,” Havana resident Juana Perez said. “But we will do it step by step, as Cubans always do.”

(Reporting by Dave Sherwood and Daniel Trotta in Havana, additional reporting by Aida Pelaez-Fernandez, Alien Fernandez and Anett Rios; Editing by David Goodman, Bill Berkrot and Kevin Buckland)