Asger Risom
A sweeping power outage that disrupted Spain and Portugal last month has its roots in southern Spain, officials say.
An unprecedented blackout that plunged large parts of Spain and Portugal into chaos on April 28 has now been traced to the southern Spanish province of Granada, Spanish authorities confirmed on Wednesday.
Pinpointing the Source
According to HotNews, Spain’s Energy Minister Sara Aagesen told parliament that a series of initial malfunctions occurred at power stations in Granada, Sevilla, and Badajoz. The cascading failures caused a sudden loss of 2.2 gigawatts, setting off a chain reaction across the Iberian power grid.
This marks the first time Spanish officials have publicly identified specific regions linked to the blackout. Investigations are ongoing, with energy experts, security agencies, and government officials analyzing the massive event.
Ruling Out Major Threats
Aagesen emphasized that preliminary findings have ruled out key potential causes such as cyberattacks against the grid operator REE, an imbalance between supply and demand, or inadequate grid capacity.
“We are analyzing millions of data sets,” she said. “We continue to narrow down the origin of the power generation losses, and now know they began in Granada, Badajoz, and Sevilla.”
A Complex Mystery
The minister cautioned that it may take significant time to fully understand what happened.
“This is a complex issue. There may not be a simple answer,” Aagesen stated.
The incident caused unprecedented disruption to businesses, transport, and essential services across Spain and neighboring Portugal, underlining the fragility of modern energy networks even under normal conditions.