ListNook

Exciting_Farmer6395 Apr 16, 2026 +25

Spoke to a Cuban cabbie who shipped (or brought) his family one of those solar generators (fancy battery with solar panels). Charge by day and runs enough juice for their apartment overnight. I mean it's not the first time a country with crappy infrastructure leapfrogs technology...

25

pkennedy Apr 17, 2026 +3

A few led lights, a led tv, a couple cell phone chargers and 2 simple fans is most of what they need in an apartment. Even a smallish battery can push a fridge through the night, they don't use that much power. During the day they turn the temp down so it gets colder, make more ice and at night they turn it up so it only kicks on when necessary and toss the ice in the fridge. Depending on poverty levels, they're probably buying and cooking food daily with limited fridge needs. If their power has gone out enough in the past, they have learned to use the fridge differently. That would be totally viable for them.

3

Koala_eiO Apr 16, 2026 +18

> In 2025, the Caribbean nation produced 10% of its electricity from renewable sources, a jump from 3.6% in 2024 Even the 2025 figure feels incredibly low.

18

lembrar_de_mim Apr 17, 2026 +13

Solar requires a big upfront investment that most naturally don’t have.

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pkennedy Apr 17, 2026 +9

Yes, but not really at the same time. The US has high tariffs on panels, decent costs on permits, very high labour for installation and of course profits. Cuba could pretty easily get the equipment for c**** from china, avoid the permit costs, and labour would be c****. Payback time would be pretty quick for them. I'm really surprised that with the hostilities aimed at them, that this hasn't been a slight priority within the government. At least to get a very very very light baseline where they could provide necessary services to the country. Even if that was just during daylight hours!

9

lembrar_de_mim Apr 17, 2026 +1

It’s still an infinitely higher investment than simply buying a few liters of oil to get you by for the next week. What you’re saying is like telling a homeless person why are you paying nightly at a motel when you’re better off buying a house instead.

1

pkennedy Apr 17, 2026 +2

Sort of. I just looked up the cost of power in Cuba for higher usage users and the wholesale cost of panels in China. We'll make some assumptions here as well. Labour is extremely c****. Government wants this (in this scenario), so permits and agreements have been made with China. The price per kwh in Cuba for a high usage user can hit 54 cents / kwh. The price to buy a 1wh solar panel (sold in 400+ watt panels normally) can be as low as 8 cents from China. A 1wh panel could produce around 150 watts in a month. So for 54 cents in solar panels, you could produce 54 cents of power in one month. You need an inverter as well, probably another 2 months of production. We're looking at 3 month payback for a high usage user. Or at least being able to reduce your day time usage to zero with a payback of potentially 3 months. The real reason to increase solar though is for government stability. Governments with projects with 1 year payback windows are generally not that hard to get agreement on. If it's a 10 year payback, sure that is more complex, but 1 year is within a yearly budget number.

2

lestofante Apr 17, 2026 +5

8 cent per watt at 400w is 32$ per panel, that does not include battery, inverters, cabling, installation framesp, etc. A portable power camping power station is generally 300$. Average monthly salary in cuba: 15$ and there is virtually no way to make saving. Even buy a single panel is a multi months, if not multi year investment. What can you do with 400w: eh, run a energy efficient fridge all day (need battery) charge phone, MAYBE charge an electric bike on a good day of if you use it little. Forget proper cooking on electric plates and heating water or the house if not for few hours per day.

5

xnmyl Apr 17, 2026 +1

Comparing to Jackery or similar systems is ridiculous Portable camping power solutions are always going to be exceptionally expensive

1

lestofante Apr 17, 2026 +1

and i didnt, i calculated ONLY the cost of the panel; as storage we can assume they use old car battery (not electric car, literally 12v car battery) and adapt stuff to run on those. I added the price of one of those sistem because, while true is overpriced, they are not too far off from a proper setup, do the math :)

1

ithinkitslupis Apr 17, 2026 +1

Arguing about how much the local population makes per day is kind of moot when gas/oil is more expensive overall and the country already has to pay for it. The Cuban government should have tried to get on long term contracts with Chinese solar manufacturers \~5 years ago to use the cost savings between the two as repayment for what they couldn't afford up front. They're speed running doing that same thing now instead. 20-25% of the grid as solar is about where things start to become more complicated to actually seriously weigh in storage or other grid makeup to the equation on a country level.

1

pkennedy Apr 17, 2026 +2

You are right. Right now the grid collapses completely. Even stopping partial collapses or having a way to keep things going for 6 hours per day would be a huge upgrade. The problem is fairly solvable, take the 6 hours of energy usage where solar can be collected and replace just that. If your energy bill is $100/month and during that 6 hour window you normally use $30/month, simply work on replacing that $30/month. That is the cheapest and easiest to replace. Payback could be in 4-6 months. From there, you have $360/year to make the system better, no extra funding required. This isn't a payback of 10 years like in the US, it can get down to literal months if need be.

2

lestofante Apr 17, 2026 +1

oh, if you talk government, where are they gonna take the money for the investment? Last proper power plant was completed in the 2000. Since then, they had no money but to keep whatever running as best as they could. What they really needed was someone like IMF come in and loan a fucton of money, but even then they would have to pass US bulshittery. And about those chineese load, ask those african county that took them.. the interest are killing them

1

Exciting_Farmer6395 Apr 17, 2026 +2

Not to be glib, but one of the reasons renewables jumped is that conventional production dropped. It's a ratio

2

feel-the-avocado Apr 18, 2026 +1

So in one year, they installed almost double the amount of solar that had been installed over the last 50 years combined.

1

No_Philosopher_5753 Apr 16, 2026 +20

For the sake of all the people living there, I sincerely hope that we can put aside our differences with Cuba to help these people out. They don't deserve to suffer as a result of a silly geopolitical d*** measuring contest.

20

Oerthling Apr 17, 2026 +7

Cuba embargo should have been dropped ages ago.

7

[deleted] Apr 17, 2026 +7

[deleted]

7

M39FG9SFGQ Apr 17, 2026 +11

The United States is a terrorist state.

11

imminatural Apr 17, 2026 +2

It's funny how the article mentions the residents banging pots and pans at all hours of the night to protest the blackouts but fails to mention what Cuba will [do to them](https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-57830160) if they are caught protesting in the street.

2

Brampton_Speaks Apr 17, 2026 +1

America creating humanitarian crises

1

RadicalOsprey Apr 17, 2026 +1

It warms my heart to see people shitting on the US for the embargo finally instead of blaming Cubans And people say Trump hasn’t accomplished anything 😭

1

As Cuba’s grid fails, solar power becomes a lifeline

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