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Spain suffers blackout: billions in damage due to planning errors!
A major power outage in Spain and Portugal due to a planning error is affecting thousands. Causes and consequences in detail.
Spain suffers blackout: billions in damage due to planning errors!
A widespread power outage occurred in Spain and Portugal at the end of April 2025, affecting thousands of people and causing massive chaos. After an official investigation, the Energy Ministry in Madrid cited a gross planning error by the grid operator REE as the main cause of the incident. Energy Minister Sara Aagesen confirmed that the additional power plant capacity was only planned for the early hours, resulting in insufficient capacity for dynamic voltage regulation at key times of the day. The power outage lasted several hours and caused various disruptions to public transport and city life.
Before the widespread blackout, there were previous power outages in southern Spain with a total output of around 2.2 gigawatts. These short-term outages were recorded just a minute before the power grids collapsed completely. The analysis by the umbrella organization of European transmission system operators, Entso-e, showed that there were no causal power outages in Portugal and France, although the incident paralyzed large parts of the Iberian Peninsula.
Specific events
On April 28, 2025, a precise sequence of events occurred:
- 12:32 Uhr: Mehrere Stromausfälle im Süden Spaniens mit einer Gesamtleistung von 2,2 Gigawatt.
- 12:33:18 Uhr: Frequenz des Stromnetzes der Iberischen Halbinsel sank auf 48,0 Hz.
- 12:33:21 Uhr: Abschaltung der Wechselstrom-Freileitungen zwischen Frankreich und Spanien.
- 12:33:24 Uhr: Vollständiger Zusammenbruch des iberischen Stromnetzes.
The Spanish government has not yet commented in detail on the causes, but is examining the available data from electricity producers and the network operator. Analysts at RBC Capital Markets identified solar farms in southern Spain as the likely main culprits of the blackout. They pointed out that a series of solar shutdowns contributed significantly to grid instability. The strong growth of solar capacity in Spain has resulted in many systems being grid-following and unable to effectively stabilize power frequency.
The challenges of renewable energies
The problems associated with the use of renewable energy are highlighted by the recent event. A key challenge is to achieve a balance between production and consumption. The intermittent nature of renewable energy production often results in frequency and voltage anomalies. These can overload the existing transmission network, especially during peak loads.
The International Energy Agency (IEA) reports significant growth in the renewable energy sector, expected to increase by 50% between 2019 and 2024. Despite this positive development, the integration of renewable sources requires additional stabilization measures. Experts recommend the use of energy storage technologies and smart grids to address the challenges of grid stability. Solutions such as installing reactive power compensation systems and building high-voltage direct current transmission lines could be crucial to avoid such incidents in the future.
What's impressive is that companies like Hive Power are already offering AI-driven solutions to improve grid stability. These technologies aim to improve energy data prediction and help grid operators make electricity distribution more efficient. The recent event in Spain clearly shows how important progress in these areas is in order to get the risks of a power outage under control.