The Perils of Abundance.(rationing of electricity consumption in Brazil)(Brief Article)

The run on candles has begun, as Brazilians prepare for strict rationing rarely seen in peacetime. The government message is blunt: slash electricity consumption by 20 percent--or else face severe fines and worse. First-time offenders will have their power cut off for three days; six days for repeat violators. Even if they follow the rules, which go into effect June 1, Brazilians may face blackouts on a scale far worse than the rolling brownouts in California. The worst-case scenarios: epic traffic jams, soaring crime and recession with a nasty ripple effect throughout South America. "We are talking about blackouts for four, five, six hours a day," says electrical engineer Roberto D'Araujo, of Ilumina, a nongovernmental organization that monitors energy issues. "Tragedy is too timid a word to describe what might happen."

Ever since the government owned up to the starkness of the situation in mid-May, Brazilians have fixed blame on just about everyone: the power companies, for failing to invest; the government, for its inertia; Saint Peter, the patron saint of weather, for withholding the replenishing rains. Whatever the cause, the crisis has served notice that the lights are fading on the days of boundless plenty. "I was happy and didn't know it," goes the bittersweet Brazilian saying.

Since 1500, when explorer Pedro Alvares Cabral washed up in Brazil on his way somewhere else, this land has been generous. "Everything that is planted grows!" gushed Cabral's chronicler. The colonists mined gold, forests and soil so heedlessly, Jesuit priest Vicente do Salvador fumed in 1627 that they were "leaving everything destroyed." Like the United States, Brazil was a restless New World frontier, creative and profligate. "Rio de Janeiro, a city that delights," goes a classic samba. "In the morning there's no water and in the nighttime, no lights."

Outages were the badge of a dynamic nation. Brazil has been improvising solutions since the 1980s, when soaring oil prices triggered the Third World debt crisis and delayed new investments (including power plants). "We are still paying for the lost decade," says Brazilian ...