China Moving In with Solar as Cuban Fuel Crisis Deepens​ 

A solar farm in Cuba’s Sancti Spíritus province. (lezumbalaberenjena/flickr/2022)

April 14, 2026 – Cuba’s energy crisis is tumbling into a near-total collapse of the island’s power system, with recent blackouts lasting up to 16 hours a day in some regions as fuel supplies run out. A recent Russian oil shipment will provide temporary relief, while China is gradually reshaping Cuba’s energy future through massive solar projects.

A third nation-wide blackout in late March left eight million Cubans without power, showing how renewables are not just a matter of sustainability for the oil-dependent country, but also offer a pathway to self-sufficiency after Donald Trump blocked the country’s oil imports in February.

Cubans have long endured energy insecurity and economic instability from decades of U.S. sanctions and the loss of a vital trade partner in the 1990s when the Soviet Union collapsed. But the current polycrisis is the most profound since the Cuban Revolution in 1959. Overwhelmed hospitals are battling dengue, chikungunya, Oropouche, and cancer amid medication shortages and now power outages after Trump halted oil deliveries from Venezuela, which once covered 50% of Cuba’s oil deficit. The Trump administration also threatened debilitating tariffs on countries like Mexico if they were to send oil to Cuba.

Even the U.S. embassy in Havana requested to import diesel for its own generators, although this request was swiftly denied by the Cuban government, which controls fuel supplies. In an easing of pressure, the U.S. allowed a Russian oil tanker through on March 29. The New York Times reported it would buy the island nation “at least a few weeks before its fuel reserves run out.”

Flights to Cuba, including by Air Canada and WestJet, have been paused as aviation fuel runs scarce, further weakening an economy reliant on tourism. Nickel mines run by Canadian company Sherritt International, a key economic engine, were forced to stop operations due to a lack of fuel, and no longer generate natural gas to send to Havana homes for cooking. The Cuban population now faces heightened food insecurity as well as a mass exodus of young professionals, including doctors, who once formed a wide network of international solidarity and support for the Cuban government.

Weaknesses in the energy grid have been decades in the making, but the confluence of all these factors has paralyzed the country and led to widespread protests against the government in Havana.

The Cuban government implemented a strategy known as “Opción Cero” (“Option Zero” in English), from the “Special Period” of economic downturn and instability after the Soviet Union collapsed. People are using charcoal and wood to cook, animals for transportation, and subsisting on the minimum required for as long as needed.

Amid the dire fuel shortages, the Cuban government has been integrating renewables into the grid. China has stepped in to help Cuba gain energy sovereignty, said Pulitzer Center fellow Anna Heikkinen, an independent journalist and post-doctoral researcher at the University of Helsinki. Heikkinen told The Energy Mix that China has been strategically supporting the transition to renewables for years across Latin America and Africa.

“Because China has no oil, that’s their way to create energy sovereignty due to the instabilities in the Middle East that we’re also seeing now,” she said. “I think that’s something we should look at more: what is the role of renewables in the future? And it seems that at least China believes that this is the future instead of oil.”

Heikkinen described Cuba as a sort of “laboratory” for renewables, which shows what proportion of the energy mix renewables can realistically make up, especially considering its heavy oil dependency.

At the start of 2025, just 4% of Cuba’s energy came from renewables. That number is expected to increase to 17% by the end of 2026, amid plans to add 92 more solar fields to the 30 existing fields Cuba installed with Chinese support. China shipped US$117 million of solar panels to Cuba last year, up from $48 million in 2024 and $16.6 million in 2019, the Financial Times reported [paywall], citing the Ember clean energy think tank. China also invested directly in the Mariel solar park, the country’s first privately-owned project that provides up to 10% of its electricity.

In January, China pledged an $80-million aid package for electrical infrastructure and sent 60,000 tonnes of rice to Cuba.

In rural regions like Cuba’s Holguín Province, small-scale farmers are benefiting from programs like the Gibara Verde X Ciento, implemented by the UN World Food Programme, that provide panels to farmers. These power groundwater pumps to irrigate fields when rainfall is sparse, enabling food production to continue even during national grid blackouts. Other foreign governments are also donating renewables supplies, with Spain and Brazil each sending 1,000 solar kits, Spain doing so amid a European Union oil blockade.

But Cuba’s aging, inefficient national grid is not designed to rely on intermittent energy sources: while solar plants supply electricity during daylight hours, the country still lacks the battery capacity to store and dispense energy overnight, despite an imported $56 million worth of battery storage from China last year, the Financial Times reported. Some $15 million of batteries came in January this year alone, but the grid remains a bottleneck to solar generation.

Meanwhile, the situation is dire for residents, as uncertainty dominates and households scramble to cook, clean, and charge their devices in the few hours they have electricity. Residential solar panels are expensive, at around US$3,100, out of reach for the average Cuban, who earns only $15 to $17 a month. Moreover, transportation services, still reliant on gas and diesel and not easily electrified, have completely broken down, forcing people to walk and cycle around the island.

Mass protests continue all over the country, with more than 230 counted in March alone, up from 30 protests in January. Renewables offer a pathway to reduce vulnerability, but they will not quell all unrest.