By Catalino Hoyos | 2024-09-19

QUITO -- Ecuador faces scheduled blackouts as an electricity crisis looms, driven by severe drought and the failure of hydroelectric projects awarded to Chinese companies.

At 10pm on September 18, the first scheduled eight-hour blackout took place to stabilize the transmission system.

More blackouts are coming.

On September 17, the Ecuadorian government announced additional nationwide blackouts for the nights of September 23–26. According to a statement posted on the presidency's X account, the blackouts will last from 10pm to 6am.

Hospitals and the ECU911 security service are exempt from the power rationing.

Chinese hydroelectric projects

Amid Ecuador's worst electricity crisis, reports have surfaced about hydroelectric projects contracted with China during Rafael Correa's presidency (2007–2017), now revealing signs of corruption, deterioration and abandonment.

Construction of the Quijos hydroelectric project, which began in Ecuador in 2011, remains unfinished, with the limited work completed now rotting in place from neglect.

Construction was halted in 2016, and since then, the hydroelectric plant has experienced significant deterioration, according to a report by the Comptroller's Office published in August.

The contract with China National Electric Engineering Corporation (CNEEC) was terminated in 2015 for construction shortcomings, including poor concrete work and significant delays.

After seven years of negotiations, mediation between the state-owned Corporación Eléctrica de Ecuador (CELEC) and the Chinese company has failed to produce results.

The project is now visibly decaying, with collapsed infrastructure and a water conduction tunnel infested with bats, according to the Comptroller's Office.

Additionally, inadequate environmental management has worsened the state of abandonment.

Despite this, the hydroelectric plant is not expected to become operational until 2028, nearly 17 years after construction began, with a projected capacity of 50MW.

The Chinese company abandoned the project, leaving behind a massive debt with CELEC.

Further issues

In 2023, the Ecuadorian government and the Chinese state-owned company Sinohydro began negotiations to address problems preventing the official delivery of the Coca Codo Sinclair hydroelectric plant, which began operations in 2016.

The Ecuadorian government refused to formally accept the plant because of numerous structural cracks.

Sinohydro completed the construction of Ecuador's largest hydroelectric plant at a cost of approximately $3.44 billion, while Ecuador invested an additional $600 million in the required transmission lines.

In 2018, the Comptroller's Office determined that the plant did not meet the country's standards for public works, even though the Chinese company asserted that the the cracks were "normal" for the plant's operational status.

The Ministry of Mines and Energy contested this claim, citing the Paute hydroelectric plant in southern Ecuador as an example. Operating for more than 40 years without any cracks, the Paute plant demonstrates that such issues are not inevitable.

Although Coca Codo Sinclair is designed to have a capacity of 1,500MW, it currently generates only 800MW, according to the Ministry of Energy and Mines.

The US Army Corps of Engineers visited the site and began advising local authorities to implement emergency measures in high-risk areas and enhance monitoring of the Coca River basin to predict and minimize power outages.

At an event in Jipijapa on September 17, Ecuadorian President Daniel Noboa said that a significant portion of Ecuador's electricity crisis can be blamed on "scoundrels of past governments who promised a lot, did not fulfill anything and left us screwed."

The legacy of those past governments' complicity with Chinese companies is evident every day, in the opinion of longtime skeptics.