Spain Blames Technical Failures and Planning Errors for April's Power Outage

Image: Spain's Congress of Deputies

On June 17, Spain's government announced that a massive power outage affecting Spain and Portugal on 28 April was caused by technical failures and insufficient planning by grid operators, rejecting suggestions of a cyberattack.

Ecological Transition Minister Sara Aagesen stated that a voltage surge triggered small failures in southern Spain's grid. Poor planning, including the absence of a replacement for a key plant needed to balance fluctuations, prevented containment. This led to a cascading failure across the interconnected Iberian Peninsula grid, collapsing the system within seconds.

The outage, beginning shortly after 12:30 PM local time and lasting through nightfall, resulted in the loss of 15 gigawatts – approximately 60% of Spain's supply – within just five seconds. Portugal's connected grid also failed. Critical infrastructure including transport, businesses, and telecommunications was disrupted. Full power was restored early the next day.

Aagesen explicitly ruled out cyber sabotage, attributing the cause to vulnerabilities and misconfigurations in security measures. Analysis from Spain's national security agencies confirmed no foreign actor involvement. The government had previously identified the origin as failures at two southern Spanish substations.