The Capitol dome lit up during a power outage in Havana on Thursday. Six months of a U.S. "maximum pressure" campaign have left Cuba facing a surge in power outages amid equipment breakdowns and fuel shortages. Photo by Ernesto Mastrascusa/EPA
July 7 (UPI) -- Cuba is slowly restoring electricity after the country's third nationwide power grid collapse of 2026 on Monday, but severe fuel shortages and aging infrastructure left much of the island without service Tuesday.
According to the latest update from Havana's Electric Co., authorities had restored 131 distribution circuits, reconnecting service to 396,447 customers, or about 46% of the Cuban capital.
Cuban authorities have not disclosed the cause of the outage, which left about 9 million people without electricity. However, Lázaro Guerra, director of electricity at the Ministry of Energy and Mines, said on state television that fuel shortages are "undeniably making the restoration process more complex."
Guerra said crews are rebuilding the system by connecting "micro-islands," or isolated power networks that rely on solar energy, hydroelectric generation and small engine-powered plants to restore electricity to limited areas before reconnecting them to restart the country's thermoelectric plants, according to Diario de Cuba.
