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Thats a really sad situation, but is common in some LATAM countries. In example, in Argentina there's an active "energetic crisis" plan [1], where government de
by randiantech 11y ago
Thats a really sad situation, but is common in some LATAM countries. In example, in Argentina there's an active "energetic crisis" plan [1], where government defined an scheduled program to cut electricity in cities to try to mitigate demand.
[1] http://www.buenosairesherald.com/article/149949/power-cuts-in-argentina--a-crisis-foretold http://www.buenosairesherald.com/article/149949/power-cuts-i...
- RikNieu 11y agoWe have it in South Africa too. The official, political term for it is "load shedding".
- Scoundreller 11y agoMost proactive electric grids have load shedding plans. The question is how often do they need to put them in action.
- _djo_ 11y agoNot entirely the same thing. 'Load shedding' in South Africa has effectively been scheduled blackouts of entire metropolitan areas, including the major cities, to avoid a grid meltdown and to allow for plant repairs. It's caused by too many plants being poorly-maintained and breaking down and insufficient investment in new power plants caused by corruption and incompetence. In other words, not regular localised reductions or transfers of load, but the same wide scale forced blackouts as being discussed elsewhere in this thread. There has, thankfully, been no load shedding over the past few months, but only because the economy has slowed down sufficiently that the country's electricity demand has dropped below its regular levels.
- jzwinck 11y agoNepal calls it load shedding too. In practice it's fairly counterproductive there. People buy banks of car batteries and inverters to store power when it's available and use it later. So they use as much power as before, with the added benefit of tons of hazardous waste from all the equipment at each building. Which of course they just throw into piles of broken stuff. Does the same happen in South Africa?
- zo1 11y agoWhen load-shedding "Season" happens, which we had recently, yes. Everyone wants to protect themselves, so a lot of people buy inverters + battery packs, or diesel/petrol generators.
- nickik 11y agoIts very typical and not just for power. It happens with water as well. The pattern is simular, unstable supply leads to private infrastructure. Demand increases when supply is available, leading to more instablilty. Quality goes down because private infrastructure is usually second rate. In egypt water quality is way down because of private storage in water tanks.
- sparky_z 11y agoAt least with Argentina there's reason to be optimistic. From what I've read, the newly-elected Macri administration seems to be taking concrete steps toward reversing Fernandez's economic mismanagement.
- the_af 11y agoBe aware the country is highly divided along political lines, and some of us in Argentina are thinking Macri is sinking the country into a profound unpayable debt and a crisis the likes of which-- well, I was about say "we've never faced before", but sadly my country is cyclical. We have faced it before, and we will again. I have reason to be pessimistic about Macri's policies.
- lucio 11y agoReally? After 90 days of govt.? "in a profound unpayable debt"? Compared to Kirchner's administration, Macri's waaaay better. This is a sample of Kirchner's gov: http://www.eltrecetv.com.ar/telenoche/impactante-video-el-hijo-de-lazaro-baez-cuenta-millones-de-dolares-en-la_084912 http://www.eltrecetv.com.ar/telenoche/impactante-video-el-hi... You can see in the video, the son and the accountant of a major contractor from Kirchner's Administration. They're counting corruption money, and drinking a scotch to celebrate afterwards. Looks like a hollywood script. Reality surpasses fiction.
- vamur 11y agoThe new government will also be corrupt. And they have agreed to repay questionable old debt by taking on new loans, and will probably receive kickbacks from the vultures.
- raverbashing 11y agoYes, it is Complainers are usually Kirchner "fans" that can't stand that people were fed up with her and kicked her out It's their strategy
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- toomuchtodo 11y agoCould this be helped by first world countries donating solar and wind generation equipment, and peace corps training programs to train and supervise the installation in country? EDIT: thanks for the replies everyone. sadness.
- lucio 11y agoIt is not a natural disaster, this is self-inflicted
- maw 11y agoProbably not, unfortunately. This type of problem isn't really due to a lack of resources and so more resources are unlikely to help much.
- diego_moita 11y agoDisclaimer: I am Brazilian, I know how Latin America & 3rd world "works". No, it wouldn't help. This crisis is not caused by lack of resources. It is caused by corruption, cronyism, patronage and, above anything else, gigantic incompetence. If "first world countries" give some help it will probably only benefit the corrupt officials.
- nickik 11y agoWhy incomppetance? People seem to be really competente at using corruption to their benefit. If it would benefit them to be competent, they would improve, but they have no insentive to do so. So I think its wrong to say "above anything else, gigantic incompetence", its more like "above anything else, bad insentives".
- aortega 11y agoNo. Argentina, Brazil and other latam countries really do not need donations. Venezuela is a very rich country that actually have the second largest oil reserves, ironically. It would be like donating stuff to Saudi Arabia. Our problem is rampant corruption, populism and mismanagement derived from it. Brazil is trying to get out. Argentina is out of it, lets hope is not too late. For Venezuela is already too late.