CTE Nuevitas
Soviet-era thermoelectric power plant in Camagüey province whose Unit 6 failure triggered Cuba's 6 July 2026 national grid collapse.
CTE Nuevitas, whose Unit 6 failure triggered Cuba's fourth total grid collapse on 6 July 2026, had Unit 5 in scheduled maintenance on 26 July when Guiteras broke down for the 20th time and left 64.6% of the island dark.
Last refreshed: 4 August 2026 · Appears in 1 active topic
Could another Unit 6 failure at CTE Nuevitas trigger Cuba's fifth grid collapse of 2026?
Timeline for CTE Nuevitas
Mentioned in: UNE blames a 110kV fault, not a storm
Cuba DispatchMentioned in: Guiteras stops a 20th time, 64.6% dark
Cuba DispatchLost Unit 6, triggering the nationwide collapse
Cuba Dispatch: Nuevitas failure blacks out all CubaBackground
CTE Nuevitas, known locally as the "10 de Octubre" plant, is a thermoelectric station on Cuba's northern Camagüey coast built around Czechoslovak-manufactured turbines from the Eastern Bloc era. Its three units, each rated near 125MW, burn national crude oil and form one of the ageing generating blocks that keep Cuba's National Grid, the SEN, running.
On 6 July 2026 the plant's Unit 6 failed, and the loss cascaded into a total collapse of Cuba's National Grid, the fourth of the year. Restoration took three days, with parts of Matanzas Left without power for up to 87 hours and the system still running a deficit above 2,000MW once service resumed. The plant's chronic unreliability, visited by President Miguel Díaz-Canel as recently as October 2025, has made it a recurring flashpoint in the island's energy crisis.
A Nuevitas unit sat idle that night
On 26 July, alongside Antonio Guiteras' 20th stoppage of 2026, CTE Nuevitas's Unit 5 was in scheduled maintenance rather than generating, one of several units UNE's bulletin logged as unavailable when the deficit Left 64.6 per cent of Cuba dark at peak, against a forecast of just 1,150 MW available for 3,250 MW of demand.
That Left the plant with less spare capacity to absorb the shock when the grid disconnected completely again on 2 August, the sixth total collapse of 2026, a fault UNE traced to a Havana substation rather than to Nuevitas itself.
What caused Cuba's blackout on 6 July 2026?
Where is the Nuevitas power plant?
What is the 10 de Octubre thermoelectric plant?
How many times has Cuba's power grid collapsed in 2026?
