The Problem Causing Puerto Rico Blackouts

Puerto Ricans spent the final hours of 2024 in darkness after a massive power-grid failure blacked out much of the island.

The cause of the latest blackout — a lamentably common feature of modern life on the island, even before the devastation wrought by 2017’s Hurricane Maria — is thought to be isolated to a catastrophic underground cable failure. But some have been quick to blame LUMA, the island’s primary utility provider, which took over Puerto Rico’s electricity grid after the island’s government-run power provider filed for bankruptcy in 2020.