Nearly 1.3 million customers in Puerto Rico experienced a blackout on Tuesday, just as preparations were underway for New Year’s Eve celebrations. Officials stated that restoring power may take up to 48 hours.
At daybreak, the entire island was plunged into darkness, cutting off power supply to electrical appliances and air conditioners before some individuals switched to generators if they had them.
Luma Energy, a private company responsible for the electricity transmission and distribution, mentioned that approximately 90% of Puerto Rico’s 1.47 million clients were affected by the outage.
The company also said the power outage was caused by a failure in an underground power line, noting it is restoring power “in the quickest and safest way possible.”
Business owners turn to their power generators to be able to keep working during an island-wide blackout, in San Juan, Puerto Rico, April 7, 2022. (AP Photo/Carlos Giusti, File)
While blackouts are rare in Puerto Rico, the island struggles with chronic power outages blamed on a crumbling power grid that was severely damaged by Hurricane Maria, a Category 4 storm in September 2017.
At that time, though, the system was already in decline after years of neglect in terms of maintenance and investment.
It was not until recently that crews began making permanent repairs to Puerto Rico’s power grid after Hurricane Maria. The island still depends on generators provided by the U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to help stabilize the grid.
Last month, the Puerto Rican government asked U.S. officials for permission to continue using more than a dozen portable generators for another two years.
Meanwhile, Puerto Rico’s Electric Power Authority struggles to restructure more than $9 billion in debt, the largest of the island’s government agencies.
Power plants that rely on petroleum generate more than 60% of Puerto Rico’s energy, followed by natural gas and coal. Solar rooftops account for only about 7% of electricity consumption on an island with a poverty rate over 40%.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
