The grid drivers required higher than a day to completely recuperate the facility provide in Spain andPortugal One of the distributing ideas is that excessive photo voltaic power created the facility outage. Is that actual?
As shortly because the lights headed out in Spain and Portugal, the hypothesizing in regards to the supply of the facility outage began. Was it a cyberattack? Atmospheric disturbance? Aliens?
Though the Spanish federal authorities is exploring the chance of a cyberattack on the Spanish electrical energy grid, the pinnacle of the Spanish electrical energy transmission system driver Red Electrica (REE), Eduardo Prieto, has ruled this out already.
Extreme regularity change
According to Prieto, 2 clearly totally different occurrences that came about inside 1.5 secs of every numerous different in southwestern Spain tossed the grid regularity off equilibrium. He claimed that this created the interruption of nuclear energy plant with a functionality of 15 gigawatts (GW)– practically fifty p.c of the energetic nuclear energy plant functionality on the time.
Very big and abrupt variances can set off a plunging failing, the place extreme regularity variations set off elements and gadgets in numerous different nuclear energy plant (and large clients), which after that instantly take these vegetation off the grid.
Prieto defined it as pretty possible that this trigger and impact may need been brought on by photo voltaic power vegetation.
Does that indicate doubters of renewable assets are proper after they state {that a} surplus of photo voltaic power triggered the facility outage?
Claim: “Renewables, in this case solar, have just caused the first major #power outage in Spain, specifically due to an oversupply of solar,” a claimed physicist with a German account, posted on X, beforehand Twitter, gathering practically 100,000 sights (since 30.04.2025, 16:40).
The particular person refered to Fritz Vahrenholt, a German chemistry trainer and supervisor, that’s vital of energy change initiatives and had really clarified in a further post on X, which drew in higher than 400,000 sights, that previous to the grid failing in Spain, the manufacturing of renewable assets, particularly photo voltaic, had really boosted higher than want.
DW actuality examine: Unproven
The supply of the facility interruption has not been successfully made clear. It is correct that on the time of the facility outage, solar energy equipped about 60% (19.3 GW) of the facility provided within the Spanish grid. Moreover, it exhibits up that photo voltaic power vegetation managed electrical energy manufacturing within the southwest of Spain.
Did all PV methods unexpectedly flip off?
For energy change doubter Fritz Vahrenholt, there isn’t a query that the surplus of photo voltaic (PV) energy within the Spanish grid was the “primary cause,” as he knowledgeable DW by e-mail. He claimed that Spain had really been compelled to export electrical energy to France subsequently.
The “secondary cause” was the lack of this transmission line and subsequently “all” the PV methods had after that “abruptly” indifferent from the grid, he claimed.
However, PV methods will not be meant to shut down abruptly. attributable to the truth that normal legal guidelines for electrical energy producers have really been in strain within the EU provided that 2016.
These legal guidelines state that PV methods must progressively reduce their feed-in if the grid regularity surpasses the restriction price of fifty.2 hertz (Hz) due to an influence extra.
“In Spain, corresponding grid connection guidelines were introduced at the end of the 2000s to ensure that PV systems do not simply disconnect from the grid in the event of a sudden grid fault,” claimed Sönke Rogalla, a scientist on the German Fraunhofer Institute ISE, Europe’s greatest photo voltaic research institute. He clarified that these houses have been validated earlier than process as part of qualification therapies.
Furthermore, data avaiable so far moreover oppose Vahrenholt’s thesis. Even if all photo voltaic vegetation had really been eliminated the grid at the exact same time, there would definitely not have really been a deficiency of 15 GW, nevertheless a minimal of of 20.4 GW because the PV consequence on the time of the facility outage went to the very least 17 GW.
However, moreover nuclear reactor, which supplied 3.4 GW, have been eliminated the grid as a preventive motion.
Is excessive PV energy a bother for electrical energy grids?
It is recorded that Spain’s energy grid hyperlinks to France and Portugal have been topped all through the facility outage. However, it’s nonetheless unsure whether or not this was the supply of the facility outage in Spain or among the many trigger and impact.
What is specific is that Spain exported an web whole quantity of three GW quickly previous to the grid interference. As an consequence of the disruption to the high-voltage line, this surplus was unexpectedly provided inSpain Such an occasion would definitely definitely be a major fear for any kind {of electrical} energy grid.
Vahrenholt thinks that the lowered number of coal and nuclear reactor in Spain was an additional bother, because the mills of such nuclear energy plant can provide to easy regularities.
This supporting influence, known as speedy guide, was presumably doing not have in Spain, composed Enrique Garralaga, a caring for supervisor at a subsidiary of the German PV component provider SMA, in a LinkedIn post.
“Technical solutions are available”
Fraunhofer scientist Rogalla verified that this will have added to the facility outage nevertheless he had a numerous viewpoint: “The blackout in Spain was not a PV failure, but probably a system failure,” he claimed, together with that “in this respect, I see it as an urgent reminder that the restructuring of the energy system poses major challenges.”
With the methods mounted right this moment, it isn’t possible to run an influence grid with photo voltaic and wind energy alone, he claimed. He moreover denied the case {that a} excessive proportion of renewable assets was an unresolvable bother. “We are constantly learning. The technical solutions are now available, now we have to set about implementing them.”
The outbound German federal authorities detailed a possible means forward in a roadmap. The governing authority, the European Union Agency for the Cooperation of Energy Regulators, or ACER, has at the moment submitted a proposition for the execution of brand-new choices at EU diploma.
Conclusion: The idea that ‘a surplus of solar (power)’ was the issue for the facility outage cannot be validated. Although a excessive proportion of eco-friendly electrical energy within the grid is simply one of many important difficulties of the facility change, it isn’t an unresolvable bother.
This brief article was initially launched in German.
