Sweeping blackouts in Cuba raise the question: Why has the island's solar buildout been so slow?

HAVANA (AP) — Cuba’s large-scale blackouts that left 10 million people without power this month may not have happened if the government had built out more solar power to boost its failing electric grid as promised, some experts say.

In a nation with plentiful sunshine, Cuban officials have long had the opportunity to encourage solar power as one solution to national energy problems. But October’s sweeping outages — the island’s worst power failure in years — show little progress has been made.

“If you had extensive buildout of solar, solar farms, residential solar and storage, for the most part, you could avoid the problems they have,” said Dan Whittle, associate vice president of the resilient Caribbean practice at the Environmental Defense Fund, an advocacy group. “But they haven’t really built the policies to get there.”

Cuban officials blame the blackouts on the U.S. trade embargo and other sanctions, the pandemic's effect on tourism, and emigration all inhibiting Cuba's economy.

But experts say the government hasn’t updated its internal policies regarding foreign ownership and private financing, especially for critical solar projects, and are still focused on petroleum fuels. That's despite the fact that as part of the 2015 Paris Agreement, the Cuban government committed to 37% of its power coming from renewable energy by 2030, an ambitious increase from an initial 24% target.

John Kavulich, president of U.S.-Cuba Trade and Economic Council Inc., said there was much hope in the business community two years ago when the U.S. changed policies enabling U.S. investment in private Cuban companies. But the Cuban government has failed to issue regulations necessary to allow the money to start flowing to the private sector, he said.

“So all of this investment and financing, not just from the U.S. but from other countries ... that are ready to take a chance in Cuba, sit idle, and that is hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars," he said.

The share of Cuba's electricity that comes from renewable sources like solar and burning sugar cane waste has increased only slightly, from 3.8% in 2012 to 5% as of 2022, according to research from the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law at Columbia Law School and EDF. That's a very small change during a time when solar and wind have ramped up sharply globally and costs have come down.

Nearly all of the country's power — 95% — comes from burning fossil fuels. Much of that is from burning crude oil, a particularly polluting form of generation.

One of Cuba's biggest trading partners, China, makes 80% of the world's solar panels, according to the energy data and analytics firm Wood Mackenzie, and they are inexpensive. China committed in March to building 92 solar farms on the island that are expected to add more than 2,000 megawatts of energy, and reports in June said China donated three solar parks expected to add 1,000 more. But that trade relationship has not yet led to a buildout that would at least keep the lights on during the day. The whole country had only 252 megawatts of solar power at the end of 2022.

Kavulich said even China has its limits. The view of China's private sector, he said, is that Cuba “seems to make no effort whatsoever to pay money that it owes.”

“The Cuban utility is the only buyer and it’s a risky investment,” said Whittle. European leaders tell him they “just can’t in good faith encourage businesses in their countries to invest in Cuba.”

Cuban officials acknowledged in recent days that more widespread solar power would have helped alleviate some of the misery from the recent outages. The minister of energy and head of the nation's electric utility encouraged Cubans to buy rooftop solar systems paired with batteries, instead of the gas and diesel generators purchased by Cubans who can afford them.

“We are thinking about” some regulations that would stimulate these solar purchases, the chief of the nation’s electric utility, Alfredo López, said.

Cuba has struggled with frequent power outages for decades. Besides the U.S. economic embargo, officials have cited aging and insufficiently maintained power plants, increased demand for air conditioning and a lack of fuel for the lack of electricity. The nation relies on imported fuel to meet electric needs, including from oil-rich ally Venezuela, Mexico and Russia.

This month’s crisis, which shut down institutions including schools, closed gas stations and left people cooking their food on wood stoves on the streets, began with one of the island’s major power plants failing.

Human-driven climate change has contributed to extreme weather events that also regularly affect Cuba’s electrical grid. Desperation over the inability to carry out basic activities has sparked recent street protests.

Whittle noted the country has no shortage of good climate scientists. Korey Silverman-Roati, senior fellow of carbon management and negative emissions at the Sabin Center, said the Cuban government is trying. “There certainly has been a will and attempts to build out renewable energy infrastructure,” he said. “It just hasn’t happened.”

On the island, technicians are working to install 26 solar projects in different provinces, López told official media last week.

Installations will ramp up fivefold over the next decade, said Lídice Vaillant, head of the Photovoltaic Research Laboratory at the University of Havana.

Besides the strong sunlight, there is another way that Cuba is a good candidate for solar. A significant share of its electricity comes from smaller power plants distributed around the country. Solar could be added or switched out in those locations. But it hasn't happened yet.

“There is still sort of this, I think, this lingering belief at the highest levels of government that, you know, fossil fuels is really the best solution,” Whittle said.

Rodriguez reported from Havana, St. John from Detroit and Lobet from New York.

Read more of AP’s climate coverage at http://www.apnews.com/climate-and-environment

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FILE - A classic American car with a Cuban flag drives down a street in Havana, Oct. 21, 2024. (AP Photo/Ramon Espinosa, File)

FILE - A street vendor selling candles waits for customers during a blackout following the failure of a major power plant in Havana, Cuba, Oct. 19, 2024. (AP Photo/Ramon Espinosa, File)

FILE - People chat on the side of a road in San Jose de las Lajas, Cuba, Oct. 22, 2024. (AP Photo/Ramon Espinosa, File)

FILE - People drive their vehicles past a floating generator in operation, in Havana, Cuba, Oct. 22, 2024. (AP Photo/Ramon Espinosa, File)

FILE - Residents prepare a soup over an open fire during a blackout following the failure of a major power plant in Havana, Cuba, Oct. 19, 2024. (AP Photo/Ramon Espinosa, File)

FILE - Residents are illuminated by the headlights of a car during a blackout after a major power plant failed in Havana, Cuba, Oct. 18, 2024. (AP Photo/Ramon Espinosa, File)

NEW YORK (AP) — U.S. stocks are falling Wednesday as some more steam comes out of Wall Street’s huge, record-breaking rally.

The S&P 500 was 1% lower in afternoon trading. It’s coming off two small losses since setting an all-time high on Friday and is on track for its first three-day losing streak since early September. The pullback follows a superb run where the index rallied to six straight winning weeks, its longest such streak of the year.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 431 points, or 1%, as of 1:11 p.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 1.7% lower as Big Tech stocks were among the market's heaviest weights.

McDonald’s helped pull the market lower and dropped 5.3% after federal health officials linked its Quarter Pounder burgers with an E. coli outbreak that’s affected at least 49 people in 10 states. Investigators are still trying to find what specific ingredient is contaminated, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said McDonald’s stopped using fresh slivered onions and quarter pound beef patties in several states while the investigation is ongoing.

Coca-Cola fell 2% even though it reported stronger profit and revenue for the latest quarter than analysts expected. The company benefited from higher prices for its products, but a lot of focus was on how much product the company shipped during the quarter, and that fell short of some estimates.

Boston Scientific also weakened despite delivering better-than-expected quarterly results. It fell 2.1% after saying it's temporarily pausing its trial of a treatment for persistent atrial fibrillation to assess “a few unanticipated observations.” The medical technology company said it intends to resume enrollment in the near term.

Boeing sank 2.4% in what could be one of the most consequential days in years for the troubled aerospace manufacturer.

The company reported a loss of more than $6 billion for the latest quarter, as it waits to see the results of a vote by machinists later in the day that could end a strike that’s crippled aircraft production for more than a month. Boeing stock has lost 40% this year.

Helping to keep the losses for indexes in check was AT&T, which rose 3.2% after reporting stronger profit for the latest quarter than analysts expected

Texas Instruments climbed 3.6% after the semiconductor company reported stronger profit and revenue than analysts expected. While revenue from industrial users declined from the prior quarter, CEO Haviv Ilan said all other end markets grew.

Northern Trust rallied 7.8% after likewise topping analysts’ estimates for profit and revenue in the latest quarter.

U.S. stocks have generally been slowing their record-breaking momentum this week under increasing pressure from rising Treasury yields.

The yield on the 10-year Treasury rose again Wednesday to 4.23% from 4.21% late Tuesday and from just 4.08% Friday. Higher yields for Treasurys can make investors less willing to pay high prices for stocks, which critics say already look too expensive after they rose faster than corporate profits.

Treasury yields have been climbing after a raft of reports have shown the U.S. economy remains stronger than expected. That’s good news for Wall Street, because it bolsters hopes that the economy can escape from the worst inflation in generations without the painful recession that many had worried was inevitable.

Traders are now largely expecting the Fed to cut its main interest rate by half a percentage point more through the end of the year, according to data from CME Group. A month ago, some of those same traders were betting on the federal funds rate ending the year as much as half a percentage point lower than that.

In stock markets abroad, Japan’s Nikkei 225 slipped 0.8% despite a surge for Tokyo Metro Co.’s stock in Japan’s largest market debut since SoftBank Corp. went public in 2018.

Chinese markets rose for a second day after the central bank cut its one-year and five-year Loan Prime Rates on Monday. Indexes rose 1.3% in Hong Kong and 0.5% in Shanghai, while European markets were modestly lower.

AP Writers Matt Ott and Zimo Zhong contributed.

A train arrives at the Wall Street subway station in New York's Financial District on Wednesday, Oct. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Peter Morgan)

A banner for LATAM Airlines hangs from the front of the New York Stock Exchange on Tuesday, Oct. 22, 2024, in New York. (AP Photo/Peter Morgan)

A banner for LATAM Airlines hangs from the front of the New York Stock Exchange on Tuesday, Oct. 22, 2024, in New York. (AP Photo/Peter Morgan)

A currency trader works near a screen showing the Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI), left, and the foreign exchange rate between U.S. dollar and South Korean won, center, at the foreign exchange dealing room of the KEB Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Wednesday, Oct. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

Currency traders work near a screen showing the Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI) and the foreign exchange rate between U.S. dollar and South Korean won, right, at the foreign exchange dealing room of the KEB Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Wednesday, Oct. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

Currency traders work at the foreign exchange dealing room of the KEB Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Wednesday, Oct. 23, 2024. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)