The hum of a dialysis machine stopped mid-session for Onasis Munoz at a clinic in Valencia, plunging his room into darkness. For the 34-year-old, whose failing kidneys require three weekly treatments, the power cuts have become a daily ordeal lasting around seven hours. The clinic's emergency batteries and backup generator are now depleted. "I arrive home, exhausted, as if I had run a marathon," Munoz told Al Jazeera. "I cannot rest because of the heat and the mosquitoes."
Anger over the outages has spilled onto the streets, with demonstrators holding "cacerolazos" — banging pots and pans — and some blocking roadways and setting tyres on fire. "We are desperate," said Patricia Cueva, a lawyer from the oil-rich city of Maracaibo. "We cannot understand how a country so rich in resources can be practically left in the dark."
A study by consultancy firm ANOVA Policy Research found that 62.8 percent of Venezuelan households experienced daily electricity cuts in 2026, up from 37.1 percent in 2024. Only 6.9 percent reported a continuous supply. Some cuts are deliberate, as the government of interim President Delcy Rodriguez rations electricity.
The government has blamed the El Niño climate phenomenon, noting that 90 percent of Venezuela's electricity comes from hydropower, making it vulnerable to drought and heat. But energy specialist Nelson Hernandez disputed this, calling the crisis "systematic neglect of the infrastructure." He pointed to "profound failures" in management, lack of strategic planning, and ageing technology, and said shifting government policies towards oil extraction play a key role.