'No big deal" Just an atmospheric phenomenon' some outages green energy absolved

[putnam6]

Looks like they went full renewables mid-April,  and you'd think they could fall back to a more sane approach easily....to avoid something like this?

From some of the articles, it seems they didn't have a clue this would occur...

[annonentity]

[Image: https://media0.giphy.com/media/l2YWzPphb.../giphy.gif]

Im listening, care to expand on this theory....

  

 I think that the Sun has just put out a good proton stream, and along with the weakening magnetic field 

 has apparently caused a resonance effect in the lines and tripped all the breakers because of the frequency change. We never saw that coming.  Earth's Pole Shift Hits Another Level

[Maxmars]

Readers' comments from WaPo

https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-e...-blackout/

That's a damning indictment against the prevailing masters of particular "news cycles," isn't it?

[IdeomotorPrisoner]

So the "rare atmospheric oscillations" aren't working for people?

What I'm wondering is isn't there energy storage capacity in the spanish grid? Aren't renewable-heavy grids designed to compensate for that lack of direct power connection with massive supercapacitors that store energy for low power generation times?

AI says:

The Spanish grid has rules in place to prevent renewable generators from disconnecting in a way that endangers the system, making it less likely that the volume of renewables alone triggered the blackout. There was also sufficient conventional generation available, including nuclear, hydro, and thermal power. 

I think people WANT to blame renewable energy. Like really really want to rub it in Europe's eco-scamming face on behalf of traditional patriotic power sources like coal and natural gas.

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/spa...025-04-28/

MADRID, April 28 (Reuters) - A massive blackout that hit most of the Iberian Peninsula on Monday was due to a sudden, large drop in power supply that caused the grid interconnection between Spain and France to trip, according to Spanish grid operator REE (REDE.MC), opens new tab.

The network lost 15 gigawatts of electricity generation in five seconds at around 1033 GMT, the Energy Ministry said on Monday evening, without explaining the reason for the loss.

REE's system operations chief Eduardo Prieto told reporters the loss of power supply was beyond the extent that European systems are designed to handle and caused the Spanish and French grids to disconnect, which in turn led to the collapse of the Spanish electricity network.

"As the result of this disconnection and the serious imbalance of band generation that is in our electrical system, the electrical system collapsed," he said in a news conference.

I'm having a little trouble believing renewable energy alone is behind a five second 15 Gigawatt drop in power. It seems like something stepped on power transmission like it was a hose.

I don't know enough about rare atmospheric oscilations to pretend. And trying to find an answer on this is proving oversaturated with crap from the last 12 hours that answers nothing.

Im gathering the story is: "rare weather phenomenon caused the grid to go out of sync, which resulted in a cascade effect that ended in massive generation reduction in an international connection that disconnected and plunged everything behind it into darkness... which has since been mostly restored."

They are sure it was NOT a cyberattack though. So that's reassuring.

[ArMaP]

Of course they are panic buying water, which leads to my question as to why isn't the government providing water to those people that didn't or couldn't stockpile water and other necessities?

There was really no need to panic buying water in most areas in Portugal, the only areas affected are the higher areas that use electricity powered pumps to elevate the water.

And distributing water to people after only a few hours without water would be a waste of resources.

[quintessentone]

There was really no need to panic buying water in most areas in Portugal, the only areas affected are the higher areas that use electricity powered pumps to elevate the water.

And distributing water to people after only a few hours without water would be a waste of resources.

Without the people knowing when the outage would be fixed there absolutely is a need to panic because people need water to drink every day. Look at this thread's title - Chaos! Doesn't that elicit panic to you?

When I lost power, I immediately went hunting for water because I could not find any information as to when I would get power back and that time of power loss lasted for two days.

That's for the people to decide what is a waste of resources for which their tax dollars pay and what about the elderly and disabled that may not be able to get out of their homes?

Like I say, it's government not doing their job.

[ArMaP]

What I am reading is described as 'severe weather' not 'catastrophic. Hey, we in the rural county here lose power if we get a wind storm. What's the state of the infrastructure like there. Maybe we can start with that.

I think the problem REN is talking about is not severe or catastrophic weather but the change in weather.
I don't know how things are in Spain now, but in the last five days or so we had a change from rain to dry weather and cold nights and today it was a hot day.

[ArMaP]

 Good catch on the 100% green energy day in Spain referenced previously.

I don't think that would be a problem in itself, as Portugal has had several days with 100% green energy in the last two years, the longest period was 70 hours.

[ArMaP]

Looks like they went full renewables mid-April,  and you'd think they could fall back to a more sane approach easily....to avoid something like this?

Spain has nuclear powerplants (Portugal does not). Some people consider those renewable.

[quintessentone]

I think the problem REN is talking about is not severe or catastrophic weather but the change in weather.
I don't know how things are in Spain now, but in the last five days or so we had a change from rain to dry weather and cold nights and today it was a hot day.

Well, the little I've been reading about the severe flooding five months ago with mostly the elderly dying and politicians blaming each other for infrastructure failures, and now this, well IMO it points to government incompetence in addressing whatever the problem is - infrastructure issues? - climate change?  etc.

"“For about six hours, we were completely isolated, unable even to make calls for information,” Michael Basquill, a resident in Torremolinos, told The Independent. “It was a total guessing game as to what was happening.”"

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world...41068.html

State of Emergency declared:

"Spain-Portugal power outage live: State of emergency declared amid fears blackout could last up to a week.
 The blackout could have been caused by ‘extreme temperature variations' which caused havoc with the high voltage electricity lines in Spain's interior, suggested Portugal's grid operator REN."

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world...40780.html

"It’s estimated that millions have been left without power and water in the midst of the blackout, and many travellers were affected by flights grounded to and from the popular holiday destinations."

Tragic.