Widespread Blackouts in Azerbaijan

Following an explosion at a large power plant on the outskirts of Baku, electricity was cut off for a large part of Azerbaijan from midnight on Monday until the morning of July 3rd. Although Azerbaijani officials had announced that necessary repairs at the Mingachevir power plant had been completed, electricity was again cut off for several hours in a large part of Azerbaijan on Tuesday evening. This comes as temperatures in Baku have reached 46 degrees Celsius over the past two days, an unprecedented level in recent decades. Ilham Shaban, an energy expert in Baku, told Radio Farda that the operational capacity of the country's 36 power plants is currently over 25,000 gigawatt-hours, with 6% exported to neighboring countries. Azerbaijan has been exchanging electricity with Iran for years. The electricity production capacity of Azerbaijan is ten times less than that of Iran, with over 80% of electricity production in both countries coming from thermal power plants. Mr. Shaban states that the problem lies in the fact that the Mingachevir thermal power plant alone produces one-third of the country's electricity. The Azerbaijani Ministry of Energy, in a statement published on its official website, said that the explosion last night was contained and the plant was restarted, but some problems persist and officials are making every effort to restore the plant's operations. Azar Energy, which is responsible for the country's electricity production, told Radio Farda that the Mingachevir power plant consists of eight generating units, four of which experienced disruptions on Tuesday evening, but within a few hours 'this problem has been resolved.'