Spain is at risk of fresh net zero blackouts just months after an enormous outage left five dead and millions with power.
The country’s electricity grid operator Red Eléctrica issued the warning as it said urgent changes are needed to how it deals with sudden fluctuations in solar energy.
The security of Spain’s supply will remain at risk unless major adjustments are made to how voltage is managed, it added.
Red Eléctrica warned that the use of renewable energy risked ‘disconnections’ in the system before the fatal power failures in April.
A family of three were found dead as a result of domestic medical ventilator failures while a 46-year-old woman died after her oxygen machine lost power during the blackouts.
The disruption, which also impacted Portugal and southwestern France, plunged areas into darkness for nearly a day, cutting internet and telephone connection, while hampering transport.
Madrid’s socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez rejected criticism of the country’s heavy reliance on renewable energy sources in the aftermath.
But experts claim the nation’s heavy reliance on solar power leaves it vulnerable to blackouts because of how renewable generators work compared with traditional power plants.
Spain is at risk of fresh net zero blackouts just months after an enormous outage left five dead and millions with power
The power surge which caused the blackout in Spain was the ‘most severe’ in Europe in the last 20 years, and the first of its kind, a report found last week.
It was the first known blackout to be caused by overvoltage, which takes place when there is too much electrical voltage in a network, Damian Cortinas, president of the association of electricity grid operators Entso-e said.
Red Eléctrica blamed the blackout on coal, gas and nuclear power plants’ failure to help maintain appropriate voltage.
While the Spanish government, who blame bad planning by Red Eléctrica, and power and grid companies are conducting their own investigations.
Entso-e last week said the mass blackouts began after solar and wind farms in the south of the country suddenly disconnected.
The same problem is unlikely to occur in Britain because generators are already required to help maintin voltage, a report by the National Energy System Operator (Neso) found.
But the blackout in Spain has still prompted warnings about Ed Miliband’s race to net zero.
The Labour Energy Secretary wants to make the electricity system 95 per cent ‘clean’ by 2030 – which would see Britain rely almost exclusively on renewable energy.
Critics claim the 2030 target is too soon to ensure the grid is sufficiently resilient.
