Cubans cheer promise of blackout-free summer

Cuba’s sweltering, mosquito-plagued summers have not been kind to its 11m inhabitants since the Soviet Union’s demise. For 15 years, daily power outages left homes in the dark and without fans to battle the heat and insects, while vacationing youths made do for hours without television or music and water pumps went idle.

But in the most significant sign yet that the post-Soviet crisis may finally be coming to an end, the lights have remained on this summer because of what President Fidel Castro calls his “energy revolution”.
At 79, and having spent 47 years in power, Cuba’s “Maximum Leader” is still capable of grandiose schemes he insists will solve Cuba’s and other developing countries’ problems.

The $2bn (€1.6bn) plan includes hundreds of container-sized generators in place of power plants, upgrading the energy grid and supplying every household with more efficient kitchen appliances from China. The state is also replacing millions of light bulbs with energy-saving fluorescent ones.

Generously financed Venezuelan oil from President Hugo Ch