Spanish grid operator ‘ignored five years of warnings’ over green power blackouts risk as socialist PM Sanchez faces mounting fury over ‘cover-up’ after deadly outage

Spanish authorities ignored five years of expert warnings that boosting renewable energy production would leave the power grid vulnerable, according to reports.

In September 2020, technicians from Red Eléctrica (REE), which operates the Spanish electricity grid, laid down a series of ‘essential’ proposals to avoid ‘unacceptable’ imbalances or disruptions to power.

But the measures have either not been implemented or have been phased in very gradually – while green energy production has been ramped up. 

Two months ago they also warned that the use of renewable energy risked ‘disconnections’ in the system, with the reduction of nuclear or gas-produced power increasing the risk of ‘operational incidents’.

The revelations, first reported in El Mundo, come in light of Spain’s historic nationwide blackout on Monday. 

The cause of the disaster, which also affected Portugal and France, has not yet been confirmed, with Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez launching a probe into the incident.

But Sanchez has been criticised for failing to safeguard the nation due to his pursuit of renewable energy production and his plans to phase out nuclear power in Spain by 2035.

REE warned last year that there was a ‘short term risk’ of ‘generation disconnections’ due to green energy integration.

In September 2020, technicians from Red Eléctrica (REE), which operates the Spanish electrcity grid, laid down a series of ‘essential’ proposals to avoid ‘unacceptable’ imbalances or disruptions to power

Sanchez has been criticised for failing to safeguard the nation due to his pursuit of renewable energy production

REE warned last year that there was a ‘short term risk’ of ‘generation disconnections’ due to green energy integration

Their annual report warned that the closure of coal, natural gas, and nuclear plants could lead to a ‘reduction in the firm capacity and balancing capabilities of the electrical system, as well as its strength and inertia.’

‘This could increase the risk of operational incidents that could affect the company’s supply and reputation,’ they added. 

And in January the National Commission on Markets and Competition (CNMC) said: ‘At times, voltages in the transmission grid have reached maximum values ​​close to the thresholds permitted by regulations, even exceeding them at specific times.’

Sanchez yesterday vowed to get to the ‘bottom of this matter’ and claimed nuclear energy would not have prevented the disaster.

‘The necessary reforms and measures will be implemented to ensure this doesn’t happen again,’ he said. 

‘We will demand appropriate accountability from all private operators.

‘With greater dependence on this energy, the recovery would have been much slower.

‘There was nuclear generation operating just before the system collapsed, and it was shut down like the rest of the technologies. Therefore, nuclear generation was no more resilient than other sources of generation.’ 

Sanchez yesterday vowed to get to the ‘bottom of this matter’ and claimed nuclear energy would not have prevented the disaster

He said: ‘The necessary reforms and measures will be implemented to ensure this doesn’t happen again’

But he was accused of covering up both the government’s and REE’s failures by Alfredo García, a telecommunications engineer and nuclear reactor operator.

‘What nuclear power plants do is provide stability to the electrical grid,’ he told Antena 3.

‘There was a very high renewable production [at the time of the blackout], which are plants that do not provide stability to the grid in the face of these fluctuations. 

‘With more inertia, that accident would have been more unlikely. 

‘He [Sanchez] clearly lied in this case , or he was very poorly informed and they lied to him. We don’t know exactly where the lie comes from, but that is a lie , and I can say that from experience.’

Miguel Tellado, a parliamentary spokesperson for the opposition conservative People’s Party, added: ‘Since REE has ruled out the possibility of a cyber attack, we can only point to the malfunctioning of REE, which has state investment and therefore its leaders are appointed by the government.’

REE, which is headed by former Socialist minister Beatriz Corredor, narrowed down the source of the outage to two separate incidents of loss of generation in substations in southwestern Spain, but says it has yet to identify their exact location and that it is too early to explain what caused them.

REE, which is headed by former Socialist minister Beatriz Corredor, narrowed down the source of the outage to two separate incidents of loss of generation in substations in southwestern Spain

REE has yet to identify their exact location and that it is too early to explain what caused them

In an interview with Cadena SER radio, Corredor said it was wrong to blame the outage on Spain’s high share of renewable energy.

‘These technologies are already stable and they have systems that allow them to operate as a conventional generation system without any safety issues,’ she said, adding she was not considering resigning.

Major outages across Spain and Portugal on Monday caused widespread disruption, grounding flights and halting trains as phone lines and internet were cut off. 

As many as 205 flights leaving Spanish airports were cancelled on Monday, with dozens more diverted to other airports, as swathes of the country ground to a halt.

In Portugal, 185 departures were put off, and 187 cancelled.

Just before the system crashed, solar energy accounted for 53 per cent of electricity production, wind for almost 11 per cent and nuclear and gas for 15 per cent, according to REE data.

Antonio Turiel, an energy expert at the state-owned Spanish National Research Council, told Onda Vasca radio station on Tuesday that the fundamental problem was the grid’s instability.

‘A lot of renewable energy has been integrated without the responsive stabilisation systems that should have been in place,’ he said, adding that vulnerabilities stemmed from ‘the unplanned and haphazard integration of a host of renewable systems’.

Jordi Sevilla, REE’s chair until 2020, wrote in an opinion piece in Cinco Dias newspaper that the government was moving too fast to decommission nuclear power plants that can provide stable generation to offset the peaks and troughs of intermittent renewable energy. 

Major outages across Spain and Portugal on Monday caused widespread disruption, grounding flights and halting trains as phone lines and internet were cut off

As many as 205 flights leaving Spanish airports were cancelled on Monday, with dozens more diverted to other airports

Professor Furong Li, from the University of Bath’s Department of Electronic and Electrical Engineering said: ‘As renewable energy sources increasingly replace traditional synchronous generation—such as coal and gas—this shift introduces significant challenges in maintaining power system stability. 

‘One key issue is the reduction of system inertia, which makes the grid more sensitive to disturbances and introduces new phenomena that we are not yet fully equipped to understand, predict, or manage.

‘These challenges are part of the evolving reality of low-carbon energy systems. Reduced inertia makes power systems more dynamic and vulnerable to instability, prompting operators to adopt faster, alternative methods of maintaining grid security.’

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