Burundanga from Zocotroco
José M. Umpierre
Permanent State of Emergency
Palo Seco Plant, San Juan Puerto Rico.
Puerto Rico’s electrical system has been diagnosed as a Permanent State of Emergency. The generation and distribution of energy on the Island is facing an unprecedented crisis, with a high risk of failure in the immediate future. The fragility and inefficiency of the system manifests itself in frequent blackouts and voltage alterations, as well as an increase in costs.
The Blackouts.
The blackouts average 19 per year and 27 hours without service. In 2024 the duration of blackouts increased by 11% and on December 31, 1.2 million users were left in the dark due to a massive failure. In the last quarter of 2025, the duration rate of blackouts increased by 16.2% and the frequency of events grew by 3.3%. The average subscriber experienced 8.02 service blackouts in the fiscal year that ended in June 2025.
The electrical phenomenon is not unique here, it is a challenge of human kind that transcends borders and localities. In the North it is reported that electricity prices have increased by 40% from 2001 and the supply to households increased by 7% in 2025. The electricity bill for the average consumer in 2021 in Spain stood at €79.11 per month, an increase of 40.56% compared to the average receipt of the immediately previous year. The average cost was 5% higher than the previous year, twice as much as the inflation rate.
The Bankruptcy of the Electric Energy Authority
The electricity system in Puerto Rico.
For decades the operation of the electricity system in Puerto Rico has been inefficient, unreliable and expensive. The bankruptcy of the Puerto Rico Electricity Authority was announced at at just the right time. It is attributed to recurrent bad administration, partisan politicization, fiscal irresponsibility, corruption in hiring, scandalous wages and rigged procedures to plunder the institution’s resources. In the course of time, the maintenance of the facilities and the costs of serving the debt was disregarded, aggravated by the politicization that the Authority has used as spoils of war and as a goose laying eggs of gold.
In 2010, the largest bond issue was made for $4.2 billion; the Electrical Energy Authority’s (AEE) debt doubled from $5 billion to $10 billion. In 2013, a last debt issue was made without a repayment source for $673 million. Very in tune with the policy of borrowing abuse that was adopted in Puerto Rico, as if loans did not have to be paid.
The Terrible Year of 2017
Natural and fiscal conditions were combined with terrible resonance in 2017. The country declared bankruptcy due to the inability to meet its public debt shortly before hurricanes Irma and María combined to wreak havoc on the Island. More than four thousand lives were lost and the country was in the dark for months.
The poor performance of the electrical system intensified after the serious damage by hurricanes Maria and Irma.
The poor performance of the electrical system intensified after the serious damage to the transmission and distribution network by the hurricanes. The Fiscal Control Board filed for bankruptcy on July 2, 2017.
On August 14, 2019, the first Hydroelectric Cooperative of the Mountain was incorporated with the mission of rescuing, rehabilitating and managing the hydroelectric plants of the Cordillera Central, which represent the inheritance of the Puerto Rican people.
In recent years, the government has undertaken an effort to rebuild and modernize the system, with an emphasis on privatizing the operation and administration of both the transmission and distribution network and the legacy generation assets of Autoridad de Energía Eléctrica, the Electrical Energy Authority.
Gone is the vision of electricity as a public affair now to enter instead into an intensive phase of privatization whose consequences have had profound repercussions on the island’s society.
A public or private service?
The permanent emergency in Puerto Rico is not accidental, it is the product of a why, ideas, protagonists and the decisions they made at the time. The fragility and inefficiency of the electrical system is potentially fatal for the most fragile people who need medical assistance equipment, for hospitals and extremely harmful for electrical equipment in homes.
It is an extraordinary cost for the state, industry, commerce, society and individuals because electricity (the light for us) is the vital force that activates the pulse of society. We are facing the great debate of electricity as a public or private service.
____________________________________________________________
Copyright 2026 by José M. Umpierre. Nuestra Operation graphic of the Puerto Rican Power Authority used under the fair use proviso of the copyright law. All other images are in the public domain.