The Spanish blackout is a cautionary tale against the EU’s green deal

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BrusselsReport.eu
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By Vanessa Combattelli

A total blackout. In Spain. In the land of sunshine and green energy.

Initial reports suggested that Russian hackers were responsible.

But it didn’t take long to realise that the problem wasn’t coming from Moscow: it was coming from the sun itself.

A technical detail, one of those that few bother to explain to the public, but one that closely concerns the direction Europe has chosen to take with its energy strategy.

The incident at the end of April occurred during peak photovoltaic production, triggering a systemic blackout.

In technical jargon, this is called ‘electromechanical inertia’, which means that photovoltaic plants, unlike traditional power stations, are unable to stabilise the grid when an anomaly occurs. Instead, they disconnect. And when they all disconnect at the same time, dozens of gigawatts are lost in a matter of seconds. The grid cannot cope. Oscillations, cascading disconnections, and the entire system collapses.

Blame the European Union

This purely technical introduction was necessary because we are now going to focus on the political cause behind it all: the European Union’s blind and inflexible targets.

In recent years, with a particular acceleration in the post-Covid transition period, Brussels, with its ‘Fit for 55’ legislative package, has asked Member States to increase the share of energy from renewables to 42.5% by 2030, with an indicative target of 45%, a much more ambitious goal than the previous 32%. At the same time, severe regulatory restrictions and economic disincentives have been introduced for gas and, above all, nuclear power, which only in 2022 was partially ‘rehabilitated’ as a transitional source in the European Green Taxonomy, and not without opposition.

A big increase of photovoltaic capacity in Spain

In Spain, a country at the forefront of solar production, photovoltaic capacity has risen from 17 GW in 2020 to over 27 GW in 2023, representing a 60% increase in photovoltaic capacity achieved in three years.

Although, on paper, these premises may seem unproblematic and even celebratory, we need to take a few steps back towards pragmatism.

In fact, the network infrastructure has not been upgraded proportionally, nor have significant investments been made in storage systems or smart grids. The result is that, at times of peak production, the national grid struggles to balance the excess energy, generating frequency imbalances that can trigger blackouts such as the one last April.

This happens when, rather than strategy and structural innovation, the emphasis is placed on implicit marketing, where numbers and targets can be touted while forgetting the arsenal needed to make things really work.

Producing more energy does not necessarily mean guaranteeing its availability. This is the great paradox of renewables: record amounts of electricity can be generated, but not when it is really needed. Energy, by definition, must be consumed at the moment it is produced, and for now, European storage systems are not up to this challenge.

The storage capacity currently operational in EU countries covers just 3–4% of daily demand. In practice, if renewable sources were to stop for a day — due to unfavourable weather conditions or simply a drop in production — we would not have enough reserves to last even a few hours.

A system so dependent on natural variables cannot be described as stable.

It is precisely this structural instability that made the events in Spain so critical: it was not enough to have sunshine, nor was it enough to have the plants. There was a lack of capacity to store and manage the energy produced. In other words, there was no modern network capable of managing the energy flow flexibly and promptly.

Expensive adaptation of infrastructure drives up energy bills

In this context, another common misconception falls: that of renewables as a ‘free’ solution available to everyone.

The sun and wind, of course, are free. But turning them into useful energy requires expensive infrastructure, maintenance and a network that is up to the task. On average, the cost of energy produced by onshore wind power in Europe is currently around 85 euro per MWh, compared to 40-50 euro for natural gas before the crisis.

On top of this are all kinds of hidden costs: public incentives, system charges, and lost investments. These costs inevitably end up being passed on to citizens’ bills.

And if there is one thing that all European citizens can see with their own eyes, it is the dramatic increase in their bills in recent years. Between 2021 and 2023, Italian and German households have seen a significant increase in the cost of electricity. In Germany, the threshold of 39 cents per kWh has been exceeded by a wide margin, while in Italy, levels remain higher than those recorded in the pre-crisis period. This figure speaks louder than many statements about the real price of the energy transition being paid by consumers.

Ecological transition policies have been presented without a real economic support plan for citizens. The abolition of gas and coal subsidies, environmental taxes and system charges imposed to finance investments in renewables have gradually inflated bills, passing on the costs of the energy transition to the middle class.

This is a regressive model, in which those who have less pay more to finance a system that does not yet work.

Russian gas through the backdoor

Making the picture even more contradictory is the hypocrisy surrounding the issue of Russian gas, which has never been directly addressed in the halls of Brussels. The European Union’s stated goal after the invasion of Ukraine was to break its energy dependence on Moscow. However, according to the Bruegel think tank, more than 20% of Russian gas continues to enter European circuits, simply passing through intermediaries — such as Turkey or China — and through increasingly complex triangulations.

Russian gas has not disappeared: it has only changed course.

The irony? Now we are paying more for it because it is purchased from third parties who keep their share.

We are paying for gas that we pretend not to use, and we are doing so twice: as consumers and as taxpayers.

Climate policy creates a real estate crisis

Another area where the green transition is showing all its ideological rigidity is real estate. In this sense, France is a perfect political laboratory for observing the contradictions of the European line.

From January 2025, it is illegal to rent out properties within the EPC’s energy class G, and from 2034 the ban will also extend to class E homes. In theory, these measures are designed to encourage energy efficiency in the building stock. In practice, however, they translate into a real silent social emergency.

In Italy, a similar measure would affect over 13 million homes, many of which are located in historic centres, rural areas and suburbs where renovation is technically difficult, if not prohibitive. The result? Properties that cannot be rented, nor sold at a fair price.

It should be recognised that the chosen method is punitive, classist and disconnected from reality. An imposed transition, without support.

The case of France is only the most obvious of many examples of how, in recent years, European politics has chosen to treat the ecological transition as an ideological issue rather than a technical or social one. Choices on energy, the environment and infrastructure are no longer presented as strategic options to be evaluated on a case-by-case basis, but as dogmatic truths to be accepted without discussion.

Growing divisions

This Manichean view of sustainability — in which everything that is ‘green’ is good by definition, and everything else is to be discarded — is creating growing divisions between institutions and citizens, between elites and territories.

Blackouts, millions of unsellable homes, costs passed on to citizens. In Spain, excessive sunshine has turned off the lights; in France, energy efficiency has turned off the property market. In both cases, the common thread is the same: the affirmation of a Leviathan that is ideological rather than institutional. A distant, elusive creature, deaf to the concrete interests of the average citizen.

And it is no better with national governments, where leaders, when in opposition, call themselves Eurosceptics, champions of the middle class and promoters of a different Europe. Then, once they have gained power, they forget all their good intentions. When they finally have the opportunity to make a difference, they do not oppose, they do not expose themselves, but smile complacently in the name of an abstract common good: that of the institutions.

But that is not enough. It cannot be enough. In the face of certain issues, more courage is needed. Sometimes technicalities obscure the understanding of certain issues, yet it is precisely here that the most concrete consequences lurk, those that ultimately affect life.

 

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