How Can Mexico Strengthen Its Electrical Grid?

Energy attorney Regina Legorreta was featured in a Q&A with the Inter-American Dialogue's Latin America Advisor about strengthening Mexico's electrical grid. Ms. Legorreta discussed the challenges faced by Mexico's national electric grid operator, the National Center for Energy Control (CENACE), in meeting consumption variabilities, which have led to blackouts. She highlighted factors such as rising population, increased energy demand, lack of new generation assets and transmission infrastructure, power plant maintenance, record-breaking temperatures and the elimination of daylight saving time as contributing to the issue. Ms. Legorreta also noted that the economic impact of these outages is significant, with losses estimated at up to $200 million per hour in the textile and export manufacturing industry alone.

"Regardless of who is elected president on Sunday, the new administration will face a great challenge, and an opportunity, to address the lack of generation and transmission capacity across the country. It is also a problem that will require intervention from the private sector because one thing is clear: the status quo will mean more blackouts, less investment and price increases across the whole value chain," she said.

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