The Venezuelan government signed an agreement with the American company General Electric to modernise the Latin American country's obsolete electricity grid, the service president Delsie Rodriges announced yesterday Monday.
The deal will allow "1,000 megawatts to be recovered in the first 24 months and over 5,000 megawatts in total in four years," said Mrs. Rodriges during a ceremony at the presidential palace.
During the current period "we produce 12,000 megawatts and consume 14,000" per day, opposition MP Esio Angelini told the French Agency, according to which before President Hugo Chavez took power, the country produced 20,000.
On May 7, electricity consumption reached the highest level in the last nine years, at 15,579 megawatts, according to the government.
The country has begun a series of reforms, especially in the energy sector, since former President Nicolas Maduro was captured in January in a very dead American military operation in Caracas and was taken to the US, where he remains imprisoned.
However, experts point out that in order to stimulate the main economic activity, the oil industry, the electricity network will need to be modernised.
This is a "historical step", the President-in-Office Rodriges considered. GE did within six weeks analysis "very specific, very thorough, of the national electricity system, hydro and thermal production", assured.
Most of the country, sometimes one of the richest in the region, suffers almost daily blackouts, lasting up to 10 hours. The capital Caracas, who has not been in such trouble for a long time, has been affected recently.
The nationalisation of the sector by former President Chavez in 2007 had ruled out 14 companies, some of which operated with funds from abroad.
Parliament took an initiative at the beginning of the month to promote reform that will reopen the production and distribution of electricity in the private sector.