Time in Venezuela

Venezuela uses the UTC−04:00 time offset. From 9 December 2007 until 30 April 2016, it used UTC−04:30. The time is called Venezuelan Standard Time (VET), and legally Hora Legal de Venezuela (HLV). It is managed by the Navigation and Hydrography Service at the Cagigal Naval Observatory in Caracas.

The official time zone is based on meridian 60° west of Greenwich.

UTC−04:30 was Venezuela’s time zone from 1912 to 1965. In 1965, the government changed it to UTC−04:00 using meridian 60° W, which passes through Punta de Playa, Delta Amacuro State. It was changed back to UTC−04:30 from 2007 to 2016.

Background
The Legal Time Service was created to provide a single standard time for the country, which lies between meridians 60° W and 75° W. In 1912, meridian 67°30′ W was chosen as the first reference, giving GMT−04:30. In the 1930s, radio stations began broadcasting time reports based on this. In 1965, Congress set meridian 60° W as official, since international rules required whole-hour offsets from GMT. This made Venezuela’s time UTC−04:00, adding 30 minutes to the previous time. Research by La Electricidad de Caracas suggested the change would save energy by aligning daily activities with sunlight.

Current standard time
In December 2007, President Hugo Chávez changed the official meridian back to 67°30′ W, making the time UTC−04:30. This later increased energy use. On 15 April 2016, President Nicolás Maduro announced a return to UTC−04:00 due to electricity shortages caused by low water levels at hydroelectric plants. The change took effect on 1 May 2016 at 03:00:00.


IANA time zone database
The IANA time zone database lists one zone for Venezuela in zone.tab, named America/Caracas.
  coordinates* TZ* Comments Standard time Summer time 

References


Other websites
 Current local time in Caracas
 BBC News: Venezuela creates own time zone
 Clocks to be set back 30 minutes on 2007-12-09 Timeanddate.com


Category:Geography of Venezuela
Category:Time zones