Is it your turn for gas now? This is how liquefied gas will be sold in Cuba.

After months of delay due to non-payments, liquefied gas distribution begins in Cuba. Some customers will receive the cylinders before others.

Only those who have not received service since January or earlier will be served first, amid a severe fuel crisis.

This Tuesday, the unloading of a ship carrying liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) began in Santiago de Cuba, after the Cuban government finally managed to raise the funds to pay for its import. The vessel had been waiting at the Hermanos Díaz refinery dock for weeks due to nonpayment, affecting more than 1,7 million homes.

Distribution prioritizes customers who have not received gas since January or earlier. According to CupetThe goal is to guarantee at least 164 cylinders per point of sale per day and achieve full coverage within 24 days, if there are no setbacks.

Logistics strategy with new rules

LPG sales will include the use of the Ticket app, which will free up 80 daily slots with a separate queue. In addition, lines have been reorganized and the support team has been redesigned to streamline the process at each point of sale.

The filling plant in Santiago plans to pump 14.000 cylinders daily—4.000 in the morning and 3.500 in the afternoon—as long as the industry remains uninterrupted.

Each customer may purchase only once, regardless of the cycle assigned to their group. Sales will continue in successive rounds, prioritized by last service date: first those not served since January, then those who purchased by February 15, and so on.

Tall buildings and priority areas in Santiago

In its first phase, distribution will focus on buildings with more than 18 floors, such as those in Garzón, Martí, Micro 9, and the municipality of Trocha. It will also supply outlying areas such as El Cobre, Melgarejo, Boniato, El Caney, and the Antonio Maceo and Abel Santamaría districts.

From the ninth day, we plan to reach other settlements such as El Brujo, Sevilla, El Espardillo, and El Castillito.

Risks from prolonged lack of LPG

Desperation has led many people to refill LPG cylinders with methane gas, which poses a serious danger. “It’s a ticking time bomb in our kitchens,” warned a former employee of the Methane Gas Plant, explaining that methane exerts more pressure and is more volatile than liquefied gas.

In provinces such as Sancti Spíritus, Villa Clara, Ciego de Ávila, Matanzas and Cienfuegos, these practices have become common.unes in the face of a total lack of service.

Only Cienfuegos produces for the center of the country

First Deputy Minister of Energy and Mines, Argelio Jesús Abad Vigoa, acknowledged that the central provinces, from Villa Clara to Ciego de Ávila, will rely exclusively on production at the Cienfuegos refinery.

However, eleven days after the announcement of the completion of maintenance at that plant, production has not yet resumed due to a breakdown of the vessel that was supposed to transport the necessary crude oil.

National crisis without immediate solution

Domestic gas production covers barely 13% of demand. The rest depends on imports, the cost of which has increased by almost 40% in the last six months. Meanwhile, more than 100.000 homes in Matanzas and nearly 99.000 in Havana, Artemisa, and Mayabeque remain without service since the end of 2024.

Despite official announcements, the full restart of the plants will not occur until the weekend, confirmed Irenaldo Pérez Cardoso, deputy director of CupetThe shortages continue, and the Cuban population continues to wait for a real solution.