Without electricity, the country has experienced a day of chaos. The cars were blocked in the middle of the streets in Quito because the traffic lights were not working. The panorama was similar on Orellana Avenue in Guayaquil. The merchants opened their businesses with the news that there was no electricity and those who managed to prepare food for sale were left with the dishes ready, with the premises in darkness and without customers to buy. The hair salons were open but they said they could give hair cuts without drying them. Thus, many Ecuadorians learned that the electrical blackouts of up to four hours ordered by the Government began, due to the worst drought in 50 years, which prevents the operation of hydroelectric plants at their maximum capacity.
Given the emergency, President Guillermo Lasso announced that he will travel to Colombia this Saturday to meet with Gustavo Petro and ask for his support to resolve the energy crisis that Ecuador is going through. “At different times, our country has sold electricity to Colombia to support the supply of its internal demand and we believe that this time there will be reciprocity with Ecuador,” said the president in X.
Ecuadorians:
Tomorrow morning I will travel to Bogotá to speak with the president @petrogustavo and seek their support to resolve Ecuador’s energy crisis.
At different times, our country has sold electricity to Colombia to support the supply of its demand…
— Guillermo Lasso (@LassoGuillermo) October 27, 2023
“Energy generation is not enough to cover the demand, which is why we have had to arrange specific and temporary cuts to the country’s electrical service,” reported Fernando Santos, Minister of Energy, although it was he himself who on October 3 at a conference The press said something else. “There will be no blackouts… The country can be calm… The Government guarantees it,” he promised at the time. As of this Friday, 21 of the country’s 24 provinces have suffered blackouts. In the Sierra and Amazon region they have rationalized electricity up to four hours and in the Coast three hours, although the latter is the one that consumes the most electricity, due to the high temperatures it has endured throughout this year.
Due to the El Niño Phenomenon, Ecuador is facing low water levels, especially in the rivers of the eastern region, where 90% of the hydroelectric plants that supply energy to the country are located. “For several weeks we have had a deficit in electricity generation. Colombia was helping us by supplying the energy that our plants could not generate due to lack of water, but they have told us that they are suffering from the same problem and have to reduce energy for Ecuador.” Santos said.
The energy deficit is 465 megawatt hours, for which the country is carrying out a contracting process that is expected to be operational until December 15. The emergency will cost Ecuador 160 million dollars. At the same time, it has activated a contingency plan to recover the thermoelectric park, but it will be subject to public contracting rules, if the contracts do not fall – as has already happened – 421 MW of different thermoelectric plants could come into operation until January of 2024.
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Ecuadorians:
We understand the outrage that the power outages have caused in the country. We are aware of its effects and we regret that we have to go through this situation. But we are experiencing the worst dry season not seen in the last 50 years. Furthermore, consumption has grown by…
— Guillermo Lasso (@LassoGuillermo) October 27, 2023
The productive sector has expressed its “concern and dissatisfaction with the sudden announcement of electrical rationing,” Fedexpor said in a statement. And “it should be done without planning and behind the backs of the productive sector,” María Paz Jervis, president of the Chamber of Production, wrote in X. “The dry conditions were already foreseen. However, no contingency plan was managed,” she added. Despite this, the authorities have asked the private sector to contribute at this time, by supplying itself. While the chambers of commerce and production estimate that for every hour without electricity, the commercial sector would stop selling 18 million dollars. They also criticize the Government for this happening in the last quarter of the year, when there is greater economic activity and when they have been hit hard by insecurity, a cost that they have also assumed.
It has been 14 years since Ecuadorians have experienced blackouts. In 2009, a severe drought led to electricity rationing for about two months. Losses in the productive sector were estimated at about 1.2 billion dollars. Seventeen years earlier, in 1992, blackouts led then-president Sixto Durán Ballén to make the decision to advance the clock one hour so that all activities could begin earlier. The measure remained more like an anecdote than a solution to the problem of electricity generation deficit. According to Minister Santos, Ecuadorians are expected to have permanent electricity by Christmas, but given the uncertainty, people have gone out to buy candles.
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