Over 500,000 users lost power in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in a massive blackout with severe impact on public transport and affecting the subway system.

A technical failure in the high-voltage system left on January 15 without electricity to large areas of the city of Buenos Aires and its Metropolitan Area, leaving approximately one million users without power amid an intense heatwave in Argentina.

The information was initially provided by the Argentine Electrical Monitoring website, as the official National Electricity Regulatory Entity site was inoperative. According to this report, a total of 589,263 users remained without electricity at 3:50 PM local time.

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The significant failure caused severe complications for the population, exacerbated by the high temperatures affecting the region.

The Argentinean Government reported that the problem originated around 2:45 PM local time when four 220 kV high-tension lines connected to the Moron substation went out of service. After 4:25 PM local time, was reported that 363,108 users were affected, mainly in Buenos Aires City neighborhoods such as Belgrano, Palermo, and Colegiales, alongside areas in the northern conurbation.

Text reads: “Reports are updated in minutes. The blackout is massive.”

The power cut also severely affected public transport. In the capital, the subway system experienced failures.

An Adjustment Context

The blackout took place against a background of strong tariff adjustment that failed to translate into a visible improvement in the quality of service.

In the two years of Javier Milei’s Government, electricity bills accumulated an increase of 339%. Tariffs thus more than doubled inflation and were over 100 points above wage developments.

In previous months, Argentine cities also experienced gas shortages during critical cold waves.

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