Sigma Live

Spain: Combination of Factors Caused April 2025 Blackout

Published March 20, 2026, 12:12
Spain: Combination of Factors Caused April 2025 Blackout

A committee of experts concluded that the widespread blackout that hit Spain and Portugal in April 2025 was not due to a single cause, but to a combination of adverse factors. The report confirms the inability of the Iberian electricity system to manage voltage overruns, characterizing the incident as the largest failure in the European electricity system in 20 years. The key to the problem was the inability to control voltage in the Spanish electricity system, resulting in fluctuations and oscillations that led to widespread production disconnections, especially from units based on converters, such as those of renewable energy sources. The blackout began on April 28, 2025, at 12:33 Spanish time, paralyzing the peninsula and causing chaos in essential services such as electricity, internet, mobile phones, and traffic lights. The president of ENTSO-E, Damian Cortinas, emphasized that this is a "perfect storm" of multiple factors that contributed to the failure. The report, the result of the work of 49 experts, confirms the preliminary findings announced in October. The report highlights the need to strengthen the resilience of the electricity system and improve the ability to manage voltage fluctuations, especially in conditions of increased use of renewable energy sources.