Five Reasons — Including One Fantastic One — Why Belarusians Had Their City Lights Turned Off
Lukashenka's outrage over the alleged high cost of street lighting and the subsequent plunge of the capital into darkness looks like a political decision. But it's more likely that something else, hidden from the public, was wrapped in the guise of "economy." "Nasha Niva" explains what might really be behind this and how much longer Minsk residents will be fumbling their way home.
Mulyavin Boulevard in Minsk. Photo from social networks
In any energy system, there are two consumption peaks: morning and evening. These are a few hours when people go to or return from work, turn on lights and appliances at home; enterprises start up, street lighting turns on, and so on.
The morning peak is approximately from 7:00 AM to 10:00 AM, and the evening peak is from 5:30 PM to 8:00 PM.
Lukashenka specifically referred to these peak hours in his speech: "Adjust these photoelements so that electricity automatically, with your artificial intelligence, turns off at 7 AM. And the lights turn on not at six in the evening, but at eight. Count it — 4-5 [extra] hours the whole country is lit, shining."
The morning peak is not critical. Sunrise and natural light compensate for lighting and relieve some of the load; the population doesn't feel it as acutely. These days, the sun in Minsk fully rises around 8:50 AM, but it actually gets light earlier.
The evening peak is another matter.
To cope with it, energy companies essentially have only two options: either increase generation or reduce consumption.
And when the lights are turned off during a peak, it means only one thing: there isn't enough available power in the system.
What then is the deficit related to? Society is not informed about this. We can only imagine more or less realistic versions that led to this situation.
Version One — A Shift in Priorities Due to Extreme Frosts
Most large urban power plants in Belarus are combined heat and power plants (CHPPs), which simultaneously produce both electricity and heat for heating. Physically, this is one process: steam from burning fuel (mostly gas) spins a turbine, which generates electricity. Part of this steam is diverted to heat water for heating networks. The more steam needed for heating, the less energy remains to spin the turbine and, consequently, to generate electricity.
Therefore, during severe cold, CHPPs objectively produce less electrical power. However, it remains unclear why such a straightforward reason would need to be masked by concerns about money.
Version Two — Emergency Outage of Part of the Generation Capacity
It is possible that an emergency shutdown occurred at one of the generation facilities, which was not publicly reported. Such incidents are not always made public, especially if the system can compensate for them by limiting non-essential consumers.
Version Three — Problem with Energy Delivery Infrastructure
Damage due to frosts can reduce the throughput capacity of lines. In such a case, if there is a real problem, energy from the NPP cannot be transmitted to Minsk in the required volume, which is why the peak is smoothed by turning off lights.
This tactic is familiar to Belarusians. Something similar already happened in January, when amid an accident on the main heating line in Minsk, Lukashenka ordered a reduction in temperature in apartments and houses to reduce the load on the heating network.
Version Four — Energy Transportation to Neighboring Regions of Russia Amid Ukrainian Strikes on Belgorod, Kursk, and Oryol Regions
Russia and Ukraine are exchanging strikes on energy infrastructure. Blackouts periodically occur in several cities of Lukashenka's military ally. For example, the day before yesterday, Belgorod experienced a blackout. Similar incidents are recorded in settlements in the Oryol and Bryansk regions.
One can imagine that neighboring regions of Russia are sending energy to those where generation has been destroyed, taking what they need from Belarus at the expense of inconvenience for the local population. Such practices have not been publicly reported.
Version Five, Fantastic. Lukashenka is Hedging His Bets and Giving Energy to Ukraine.
The most extravagant and least probable version is that Belarus is exporting electricity to Ukraine, which is suffering from Russian strikes on its generation facilities. Technically, this is possible. In such a case, the words about saving money are a disguise for secret services to a country that is preparing to open a criminal case against Lukashenka.
Under any of these versions, light should return to Belarusian cities synchronously with the warming weather.
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