Stockholm (NordSIP) – In the morning of April 28th, at 12:33pm CET Spain, Portugal and parts of Southern France suffered massive electric power outages. Although power was restored to Spain and Portugal by 12:30am, the blackout caused significant disruptions to economic activity of the two Iberian countries.
A complete and accurate official account of what happened is not yet available but the issue appears to have originated in Spain, whose electric grid is intimately linked to Portugal’s. That being said, the possibility of a cyber attack on the grid appears to have been ruled out by both Portugal and Spain at this stage. Spain has announced a formal inquiry to determine what actually happened, but based on comments provided by the electricity grid operators of both countries as the crisis unfolded, a number of hypotheses have emerged.
Despite the preliminary nature of present assessments of the blackout, Monday’s crisis raises important questions about climate change as well as renewable energy solutions.
What Happened?
Generally speaking, unplanned power cuts tend to be caused by extreme weather events such as storms, lightning strikes or high winds. Given the spread of the shutdown to the whole of Spain and Portugal, it is also worth noting that power outages also occur because of issues with power stations, power distribution lines, substations or other parts of the system.
Reports discussing the potential sources of the problem appear to have originated from Portugal. The country’s energy grid, Redes Energéticas Nacionais (REN) was reported to have attributed the blackout to a “rare atmospheric phenomenon” which had caused a severe imbalance in temperatures.
“Due to extreme temperature variations in the interior of Spain, there were anomalous oscillations in the very high voltage lines (400 kV), a phenomenon known as ‘induced atmospheric vibration’. These oscillations caused synchronisation failures between the electrical systems, leading to successive disturbances across the interconnected European network,” REN is reported to have said to the BBC during the day. However, this report was later refuted by REN, according to the same source.
“Power systems are networks, connecting local disruptions to wider areas. They must balance supply and demand almost instantaneously, and generators need to stay precisely in sync (AC ~50 Hz). If something on the network — a generator, a power line, or even a large electricity user — suddenly disappears, it creates a supply-demand imbalance, and the system frequency starts to shift. If that shift becomes too large, other components can trip offline, creating a snowball effect that worsens the imbalance and can trigger a major blackout — sometimes within seconds,” said David Brayshaw, Professor of Climate Science and Energy Meteorology, University of Reading.
At its press conference, Eduardo Prieto, head of operation services at Spain’s power company Red Eléctrica de España (REE), the country’s electricity grid manager said that there were two “disconnection events”, barely a second apart, just before the blackout on Monday. He said the incidents took place in the south-west of Spain, where there is substantial solar generation, according to the BBC.
Spain is one of Europe’s largest producers of renewable energy. The latter report is consistent with data from REE, according to which the source of electricity that lost the most output was photovoltaic solar.
The location of the problem is also consistent with the distribution of photovoltaic power plants in Spain, where the southwest of the country is one of the places with the highest potential for solar power.
France Could Handle It
The blackout extended to the Basque region of South-west France, but was quickly contained as France’s Réseau de Transport d’Électricité (RTE) stepped in to provide 2,000 MW throughout the day. The problem lasted from 12:38 to 13:30.
Electric blackouts are a very rare occurrence in Europe. This is the first electric blackout in Western Europe since 2006 when Germany suffered one such event. Prior to that, Italy had suffered one such incident in 2003 and France in 1987 and 1978, according to RTE.
Remaining Questions
The entire narrative of events remains unconfirmed at the time of writing and the facts described above are still preliminary. Fundamentally, there is no official answer to the question “What actually happened?” So that should be the starting point of enquiries going forward. The question is not trivial and the delay in answering it has seen REE being accused of lack of transparency regarding the events that took place on Monday.
However, the issue seems to be relevant for sustainable investors. If it is so that a “rare atmospheric phenomenon” caused “induced atmospheric vibration” which interfered with the transmission of electricity, then one ought to ask whether these atmospheric phenomenon is caused by climate change and whether such events will become more regular. However, if the blackout was the result of some failure associated with solar power, it is crucial to determine how, why, whether such failure is related to intermittency issues, and what can be done to avoid such occurrences in the future.
Last but not least, Portugal and the wider European grid, should be trying to ascertain why Portugal was immediately affected by Spain’s shutdown when France was not.
