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A massive power outage left tens of thousands of people without electricity Thursday night across South Orange County and parts of San Diego County. San Diego Gas & Electric reported that more than 100,000 customers were initially affected. Video taken near the Civic Center in Mission Viejo showed one of the areas impacted by the blackout. Other areas that were impacted included Laguna Hills and Laguna Niguel. The cause of the outage was not immediately known.

US President Donald Trump vowed Monday to “take” Cuba as the communist island plunged into darkness under a total power blackout linked to a crippling oil embargo imposed by Washington. After nearly seven decades defying the United States, Havana’s communist authorities are under massive pressure from a Trump administration determined to make history. “You know, all my life I’ve been hearing about the United States and Cuba. When will the United States do it?” Trump told reporters at the White House. “I do believe I’ll be…having the honor of taking Cuba,” Trump said. “Whether I free it, take it —...

On Monday, Cuba experienced a total shutdown of its National Electric System, as reported by the Union Eléctrica (UNE). The organization confirmed the collapse and announced that protocols for restoring power were being activated. "A complete disconnection of the National Electric System has occurred. Protocols for restoration are being implemented. We will continue to provide updates," the UNE stated in a Facebook post. Meanwhile, the Ministry of Energy and Mines indicated that an investigation into the causes of the blackout is underway, though no further details were provided. The nationwide blackout followed a day already plagued by severe service disruptions....

Gov. Hochul has spent much of her 4 ¹/₂ years in office facing a time bomb left by her predecessor: drastic, legally binding greenhouse gas reduction targets that the state has no practical means of meeting. The 2019 Climate Act requires New York to cut greenhouse gas emissions by about one-quarter from that year’s levels by 2030. The state has made little progress toward this goal, in part because officials shuttered New York’s largest nuclear power plant in 2021. The law remains on the books, and its defenders balk at revision. If Hochul can’t persuade them to change it, Albany’s...

The North American Electric Reliability Corporation reported Tuesday that winter electricity demand is increasing, especially in regions with high concentrations of artificial intelligence data centers. NERC outlined in its 2025-2026 reliability report that “much of North America” is at risk of failing to meet demand in “extreme operating conditions.” Regions loaded with energy-hungry AI data centers face heightened outage risks during intense winter weather, according to NERC. “Winter electricity demand is rising at the fastest rate in recent years, particularly in areas where data center development is occurring,” NERC said on Tuesday. “Although resources are adequate for normal winter peak...

Forced electric load reduction and possible rolling blackouts in Maryland. Electric system in crisis. Got Coal?

The Trump administration's Department of Energy (DOE) on Monday released a report that found currently scheduled retirements of energy-generating facilities coupled with delays in bringing new power sources online could lead to a rise in blackouts by the end of this decade. DOE's report found that with about 104 gigawatts of energy-generating capacity scheduled to be retired by 2030, power outages could see a significant rise if that capacity isn't replaced in a timely manner. It is estimated that annual outage hours could rise from single digits today to over 800 hours per year. The agency noted that while 104...

The U.S. Department of Energy has ordered another power plant, this time an oil and gas plant in Pennsylvania, to keep its turbines running through the hottest summer months as a precaution against electricity shortfalls in the 13-state mid-Atlantic grid. The department’s order to the grid operator, PJM Interconnection, regarding the Eddystone power plant just south of Philadelphia on the Delaware River, is the department’s second use of federal power under President Donald Trump to require a power plant to keep operating on the mainland United States. Constellation Energy had planned to shut down Eddystone’s units 3 and 4 on...

Undisclosed communication devices reportedly discovered in Chinese-manufactured solar panels and related equipment have sparked concerns among U.S. officials about the vulnerability of the nation’s power grid, according to a Reuters report. These “rogue” devices, found over the past nine months, could potentially destabilize energy infrastructure and trigger widespread blackouts, sources familiar with the matter told the outlet. The undocumented devices, including cellular radios, were identified in solar power inverters, batteries, electric vehicle chargers, and heat pumps produced by several Chinese suppliers. ... The U.S. has found Trojan horse communication devices in Chinese-made solar power inverters. They are used to connect...

The Texas Senate passed a bill Thursday that leading business interests fear would lead to an age of expensive power and rolling blackouts. If passed by the House, state S.B. 715 would require all renewable projects — even existing ones — to buy backup power, largely from coal or gas plants. This would require solar plants in particular to buy backup power to “match their output at night — a time when no one expects them to produce energy and when demand is typically at its lowest anyway,” consultant and energy expert Doug Lewin wrote in an April analysis. The...

President Donald Trump’s Interior Secretary Doug Burgum is warning that the United States is at risk of major widespread blackouts similar to the power cuts that recently shut down most of Spain and Portugal.. Burgum said the blackouts in Europe were caused by over-subsidizing intermittent renewable energy sources. However, he warns that America is now “dangerously close” to suffering from similar “rolling blackouts and grid failure.” Speaking to David Freeberg on “The All-In Podcast,” Burgum admitted that the artificial intelligence (AI) “arms race” with China keeps him “awake at night” due to the amount of electricity that the technology requires....

The Spanish blackout made us all aware of how unstable the grid can get when renewables are in the driver’s seat, but one should also not forget that they don’t come cheaply. The idea of getting free energy from wind and solar is inaccurate. Man must build machines to extract energy from nature and those machines, windmills and solar panels, are expensive. ... renewables are unreliable and expensive

Blackouts are becoming longer and more common in Xcel’s Colorado service territory, with 90,000 customers experiencing 6 or more outages in 2024.. Xcel Energy, Colorado’s largest electricity provider, is having increasing difficulty answering customer calls, sending out bills and keeping the lights on, according to two reports by state utility regulators. Blackouts more than doubled in 2024 and customer complaints have jumped 100% in three years, according to a Colorado Public Utilities Commission briefing Wednesday on outages. Outages have become more prevalent across Xcel Energy’s service territory which includes zones from the northeast, near Sterling, to Greeley, the Denver metro...

Yesterday I put out a Substack article called Rage, Rage Against the Dying of the Light. The article was about the Gates backed UK government plans to provide 50-80 million pounds of funding and commence experiments to block out the sun. I covered this extensively in my book Gates of Hell: Why Bill Gates is the Most Dangeous Man in the World. A large part of that book was about the core problems with Gates, which are: 1. Totally undemocratic and unaccountable networks of power allowing one man with no elected role or mandate to direct public policy. 2. Totally...

Cuba’s power grid collapsed Friday night, triggering a nationwide power outage and plunging its more than 10 million people into darkness. “At around 8:15 p.m. tonight, a failure at the Diezmero substation caused a significant loss of generation in the west of #Cuba and with it the failure of the National Electric System,” Cuba’s Ministry of Energy and Mines said in a statement. Efforts to restore service are underway, the ministry added. Video filmed by CNN in the capital Havana showed streets and buildings shrouded in total darkness, as people used electric torches to navigate the streets. It marks the...

The U.S. Postal Service’s multibillion-dollar program to purchase electric mail delivery trucks is severely delayed, another bungled EV program to further tarnish Joe Biden’s presidency. The Washington Post reports that the U.S. Postal Service’s ambitious plan to modernize its aging delivery fleet with electric vehicles is significantly behind schedule. The $10 billion project, which received $3 billion in funding from the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act, is a crucial part of outgoing President Joe Biden’s climate change agenda.

In 2018, the city council of Broken Hill in New South Wales, Australia, had hoped to become the country’s first carbon-free city by 2030. About $415 million USD was invested in solar, wind and battery projects within 15 miles of the town of 19,000. These generators were supposed to supply enough electricity to power 117,000 homes. Then in October, a storm hit the region, destroying power lines connecting the town to dispatchable power from the New South Wales grid, and the entire town was plunged into rolling blackouts. While things gradually returned to normal over a few weeks, the region...

One of the best ways to create an environment in which an economy can thrive is to have abundant, reliable, reasonably priced energy; a sure way to destroy an economy is to make it so only the rich can afford the utilities.Here, Pakistan accepted China’s help, just like many poor countries around the world, and became energy dependent on China. Now, the Pakistani people can’t afford the energy bill, and Pakistan is in massive debt to China.Pakistan’s Reliance on Chinese-Built Power Plants Is Strangling Its EconomyPakistan turned to Beijing to solve a crippling energy shortage. Now, crushed under debt and...

The Department of Energy (DOE) announced Thursday that it would provide up to $360 million in public funding to construct a 320-mile line connecting the ERCOT grid to power grids in the southeastern U.S. According to the DOE, the line, called the Southern Spirit, will be used to "enhance reliability and prevent outages" during potentially catastrophic weather events. ERCOT's grid, which can draw power from other grids but is otherwise contained in its own bubble, infamously failed in February 2021 during a significant freeze that gripped the entire Lone Star State. Also known as Winter Storm Uri, the freeze led...

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky offered an alarming update on nationwide Russian bombings of his country on Monday, describing blackouts “everywhere” and significant harm to Ukraine’s power grid. The Russian military launched a sweeping drone and missile campaign on Monday in which it reportedly focused on bombing energy infrastructure. Some Russian media reported that the strikes impacted at least nine regions of Ukraine – including the capital, Kyiv – while Ukrainian state media listed at least “15 regions” suffering various negative effects from the “large-scale Russian attack” out of the nation’s 27. The attack is the largest Russian operation within Ukraine...