Causes of Spain’s energy blackout unclear, but right wingers try to make it about renewables

The causes of a massive blackout in Spain and Portugal on 28 April remain unclear, though initial reports blames “extreme temperature variations”. Right-wingers, however, are trying to make it about renewable energy.

Spain is one of the European countries that most relies on clean energy. It is “the EU member state with the second-largest, external renewable energy infrastructure”, and prime minister Pedro Sánchez has called the country “a driving force of the energy transition on a global scale”. His government has overseen a boom in the sector – especially in solar energy. Indeed, solar power now makes up around 53% of the country’s electricity production. And Sánchez wants to go even further.

Some critics, however, have highlighted the risk of generating a surplus of energy. So there have been arguments in favour of linking Spain up to Europe to help supply “cheap, competitive solar power”.

Right-wing forces with links to fossil-fuel interests, however, aren’t happy about the direction things are going. And if they can plant the idea that this week’s blackout had a connection to renewable energy, they might be able to put a spanner in the works.

Spain: ‘the technology is stable. Renewables are not the cause’

Spanish grid operator REE has denied that renewable energy had anything to do with the outage. Its head, Beatriz Corredor, insisted:

These technologies are already stable, and they have systems that allow them to operate as a conventional generation system without any safety issues

She added:

Renewables are not the cause

The electricity grid operator in Portugal, REN, had initially claimed that a “rare atmospheric phenomenon” caused a “fault in the Spanish electricity grid”, leaving many millions of people without power for many hours. REE said on 30 April that it had identified the source of the problem, relating to “two separate incidents of loss of generation in substations in southwestern Spain”. Investigations, however, are ongoing.

Energy commentator Antonio Turiel, however, believes that integration of new energy sources has happened “without the responsive stabilisation systems”. He argues that planning has not been up to par, and may have played a role. Others insist that significant investment is necessary to update the grid.

Expert Diego Mateos, however, has stressed that it may be months before we finally know what was behind the outage. And for that reason, the government has not ruled out the possibility of something like a cyberattack.

Featured image via the Canary