In the 2019 book "Sandworm", which discusses cyber warfare against infrastructure like this, but between Russia and Ukraine, the author begs the question in an interview with a US military/intelligence official,

"why doesn't the US go after these hackers and designate targeting civilian infrastructure as a crime?"

To which the response was essentially "The US would like to reserve those types of cyber attacks for their own uses"

These quotes are very loose, I read it last year, but essentially, the US didn't make a stink about older grid attacks in order to save face when the US does it.

Additionally, much of VZ's difficulty was due to the massive sanctions against the nation. Sanctions are effectively attacks on a nation's citizens to pressure the government. Disabling power infrastructure is absolutely in-line with the motives of sanctions and embargos.

Good point. It's easier to say you got hacked by nation state actors than to tell your boss you accidentally screwed up a major system with no way to recover. It's not like 99% of the management could tell the difference.

Is there a particular reason to take any state account of anything at all at face value? At some point you either have to accept to play the game or reject all news.

In this case, it fits squarely in with American foreign policy, especially their orientation towards Venezuelan chavismo.