Update 5:30 p.m. — The possibility of a cyberattack appears to be receding. Antonio Costa, the president of the European Council, stated that "at this stage, there is no indication that this is a cyberattack." REN, the Portuguese grid operator, explained that the outage was linked to "extreme temperature variations" in Spain. This atmospheric phenomenon caused "abnormal vibrations" in high-voltage lines, causing synchronization errors between the electrical systems.
Original article, 4:17 p.m. — Spain, Portugal, and part of southern France have been affected by a power outage of unprecedented magnitude since midday. A gigantic blackout has paralyzed activity across the Iberian Peninsula, and full recovery is expected between 9 p.m. and 1 a.m. Hospitals are running on generators.
Outages also in France
REE (Red Eléctrica de España) is the public operator that manages the transmission of electricity throughout the country. It is the Spanish equivalent of the French RTE. According to the latest news, several power generation units in the north, south, and west of the peninsula have been reactivated. The current objective is to restore voltage to all of these units, which are essential to the network infrastructure.
In France, the RTE (Electricity Transmission Network) is also on deck. The company explains that the Iberian network was "automatically disconnected from the European network from 12:38 p.m. to 1:30 p.m.," after which the 400 kV power line between French and Spanish Catalonia was restored to service.
RTE confirms that homes were without power "for a few minutes in the Basque Country." In France, the electricity supply has indeed recorded significant variations since the beginning of the morning:
As soon as the REE is technically capable, the RTE will be able to increase its aid to Spain to 950 MW. While the power is being restored, the question of the origin of the incident also arises. El Pais reports that the CNI (Spanish National Intelligence Center) and the Portuguese authorities have not ruled out a cyberattack. But for the moment, very little information has leaked out.
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