Venezuela, the main oil exporter in South America, suffered from a long drought that significantly reduced the volume of water in the dams of hydroelectric plants. For 2009, 73% of the electric energy consumed by Venezuelans depended on these plants. Additionally, the country's electricity consumption has been increasing by 6% per year, a percentage that exceeds the growth rate in the electrical supply that has been installed. Most of Venezuela's power comes from one of the
largest hydroelectric dams in the world,
Guri Dam in
Bolívar State,
Venezuela on the
Caroni River; as of 2019, 70–80% of Venezuela's power comes from Guri. Venezuela has a history of electrical blackouts dating at least to 2010; Juan Nagel wrote in
Foreign Policy in 2016 that the problems resulted from "massive government corruption [...] and the country’s disastrous energy policies".
Univision also reported that the problems in the energy sector resulted from corruption and "lack of maintenance and investment". The private company,
Electricidad de Caracas was owned by the United States'
AES Corporation until 2007; according to
The Wall Street Journal, "Venezuela's power grid was once the envy of Latin America". and by the beginning of February 2010, the level of the dam had dropped nine meters below its optimum level. If the level of the Guri reservoir falls below 240
masl, some turbines in the plant could not work, and the country's electricity supply would decrease. The government foresaw that if nothing were done, this level would be reached in May 2010, so it began to execute a series of measures that seek to reduce electricity demand and minimize Venezuela's dependence on hydroelectric power plants. By the end of March 2010, this date had been postponed to June 2010. On 9 March, Chávez was more emphatic about it, declaring: Subsequently, on 18 March, the Minister of Electric Power,
Alí Rodríguez Araque, accused the Venezuelan opposition of causing fear in the population by talking about a "collapse." On 23 April, the Minister of the Environment, Alejandro Hitcher, assured that the Guri would reach a normal growth rate within fifteen or twenty days. However, according to Miguel Lara, former general manager of the Interconnected Systems Operation Office, the crisis continued due to problems in the thermal generation park and transmission lines, although he recognized that it is unlikely that the Guri will collapse.
Thermal park deficiency The National Electric Corporation, the public body that manages all electricity generating companies, acknowledged that by the end of 2008, 79% of thermoelectric plants were more than 20 years old, and that 30% were unavailable due to technical problems. In addition, of the plants that were working, many did not do so at full capacity: 3,800 MW were generated, when the installed capacity was 9,051 MW. Although the funds to reactivate an additional unit were delivered months before, for the start of the crisis the work was 21 months behind. Subsequently, on 27 March, a unit was stopped for maintenance. By the beginning of April 2010, Planta Centro operates only with a unit of 400 MW, which is only generating 250 MW. Electrical specialists believe that Planta Centro is unlikely to recover in the short term, claiming lack of maintenance in recent years as the main cause. According to figures from the Office of Operation of Interconnected Systems, the Chávez government completed less than half of the investments in thermoelectric energy generation planned in 2005. Alí Rodríguez has denied that the government has not made the necessary investments, although he acknowledged that there are delays in the execution of projects. Due to the distribution of the fault, Ciro Portillo, former vice president of Enelven, has assured that it is due to overload in one of the three transmission lines that start from the Guri. The company Enelven, responsible for the affected areas, has not reported on the causes of this energy slump. For its part, the National Management Center has reported that Cadafe-Occidente overloads transmission lines daily. ==Responses==