Spain and Portugal join forces to investigate massive Iberian blackout

Saturday 03 May 2025 - 11:05

By: Dakir Madiha

Spain and Portugal join forces to investigate massive Iberian blackout

Spain and Portugal have established a joint committee aimed at uncovering the cause of a significant power outage that disrupted the Iberian Peninsula earlier this week. This event, one of Europe’s largest blackouts, affected millions in both countries, severing telephone and internet connections, halting public transport, and casting urban areas into darkness.

Despite the widespread impact, officials have yet to pinpoint a definitive cause for the outage. "We will collaborate to identify the causes of the incident and implement the necessary measures to ensure this doesn't happen again," remarked Spain's Minister of Ecological Transition, Sara Aagesen, after a meeting with her Portuguese counterpart, Maria da Graca Carvalho. The two ministers emphasized the need for coordinated communication with European authorities regarding the incident.

As the days pass since the chaotic blackout, which plunged both nations into turmoil for several hours, experts and authorities remain without an official explanation. "It is very important to gather all the information to understand what triggered the incident, which, as you know, occurred on the Spanish electricity transmission network," conveyed the Portuguese minister to local media.

Madrid reported that approximately 60 percent of Spain's electricity consumption—equivalent to 15 gigawatts—vanished within a mere five seconds during the outage, a phenomenon described by the government as "unprecedented." Among the various theories being explored, Spanish authorities are investigating the possibility of a cyberattack. However, Spain's electricity grid operator (REE) has dismissed this scenario, stating that it found "no intrusion" in its control systems.

In its analysis, REE suggested that the blackout may have been triggered by two separate incidents occurring just one and a half seconds apart. One hypothesis points to a disruption in solar power production in Spain's southwest as a potential origin of the blackout.