By The opinion
May 8, 2024, 2:54 PM EDT
The Mexican president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, argued that it was “something exceptional” due to the heat, the emergency in the electrical system that the National Energy Control Center (Cenace) declared on Tuesday and that caused blackouts in about half of the states in the country.
“Yesterday’s blackouts (Tuesday, May 7) They showed up, first, because the heat was very intense yesterday throughout the countryhere (in Mexico City) it reached 33 degrees at around that time, around 4 in the afternoon (22:00 GMT), and Cenace, which controls the energy distribution, has alarm systems. and the alarm was set,” he said.
The president acknowledged in his morning press conference that “for a short time, not in the entire country, there were blackouts,” although “fortunately the entire electrical energy system was restored again.”
“Right now I have a meeting for that, but to tell people that we have energy generation capacity, even with this. I think it was something exceptional, that was not expected. We have to avoid it,” she said.
The Mexican president referred to the emergency that Cenace declared in the National Interconnected System after registering on Tuesday a maximum demand of 49,887 megawatts (MW) and an operational reserve margin of 3% at 4:36 p.m. (22:36 GMT ) yesterday, Tuesday, May 7.
Cenace declared an ‘Operational State of Emergency’ at 5:04 p.m. (23:04 GMT) for 48 minutes and then another at 8:10 p.m. (02:10 GMT on Wednesday) for one hour, which caused blackouts in cities in about 16 of the 32 entities. territorial areas of the country, including Mexico City, according to user testimonies collected by the national press.
The Federal Electricity Commission (CFE), the state electricity company, has not detailed the number of affected users nor has it specified which cities suffered blackouts.
The emergency arrived while Mexico faces a second heat wave with temperatures above 40 degrees in 22 states of the countrys, including 11 with temperatures greater than 45 degrees, while the Mexican capital registered 33.4 degrees, a record for any May 7.
But it also happens while the López Obrador Government faces questions from the opposition and businessmen for implementing policies to favor the CFE and hinder private investment in renewable energy, which, according to them, has affected electricity generation.
“Half of the electricity generation is still produced by private companies and we have to come to an agreement so that they have the plants in good condition, all the generation plants and that we all help,” the president now commented.
The state of emergency caused power outages in regions of different states including Mexico City, State of Mexico, Puebla, Hidalgo, San Luis Potosí and Guanajuato, among others, where users reported the lack of electricity on social networks.
With information from EFE.
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