A mere week after Spain bragged that its electric grid was powered solely by renewable sources, the system crashed, sending Spain, Portugal, and even parts of France into total darkness.
The power loss, which lasted for about 10 hours, caused a reported $1.6 billion in economic damage in Spain. It was also avoidable, if only they’d listened to the warnings of the Spanish grid operator.
For that matter, they also didn’t learn anything from a longer-lasting blackout that took place in Texas four years earlier.
Will Hild, executive director of Consumers’ Research, posted images to X from two headlines dated six days apart and said, “For those keeping score at home:
“April 22nd: Spain brags about hitting 100% renewable power.
“April 28th: Spain has the nation's largest blackout in history.”
But it wasn’t just residences and businesses left in the lurch. Transportation also came to a standstill. Aircraft were unable to depart, and those wanting to land were diverted to other countries.
Even vehicular traffic was affected.
“I was driving and suddenly there was no traffic lights … It was a bit of a jungle,” Luis Ibáñez Jiménez told CNN. “I saw a massive bus coming, and I had to accelerate a lot to go past it.”
Spanish grid operator REE [Red Eléctrica de España] ruled out a cyber-attack after power was finally restored, but had advised two months earlier that placing too much reliance on renewable energy sources could lead to problems.
Redeia, which owns Red Electrica, warned in February in its annual report that it faced a risk of “disconnections due to the high penetration of renewables without the technical capacities necessary for an adequate response in the face of disturbances.”
Javier Blas, energy and commodities columnist at Bloomberg, called the event “The first big blackout of the green electricity era.”
But it wasn’t the first or even the worst. A longer-lasting blackout occurred in Texas four years earlier.
While Texas was battered by three major winter storm systems that swept across the United States in February of 2021, up to 4.5 million homes and businesses were without power, leading to heat, water and food shortages.
The blackout was caused by a variety of factors, all weather-related.
"Our wind and our solar got shut down and ... that thrust Texas into this situation where it was lacking power at a statewide basis," Gov. Greg Abbott said. "As a result, it just shows that fossil fuels are necessary for the state of Texas as well as other states to make sure that we're able to heat our homes in the wintertime and cool our homes in the summertime."
Green energy proponents pointed out that only about 27% of the state’s electric grid is powered by renewables (25% wind, 2% solar), while the bulk of its needs are met by natural gas (35%) and coal (22%).
True enough, but renewable energy sources still let Texas down in its time of need.
And in a similar manner, a Reuters headline proclaimed, "Don’t blame renewables for Spain’s power outage.”
Conservative commentator Steve Guest observed that if you read beyond the headline, the second sentence in the story said, "the issue appears to be the management of renewables in the modern grid."
Guest added, “This is why no one trusts the media. The headline is completely undermined by the 2nd sentence” and concluded, “What ridiculous language games.”
Meanwhile, as Spain is trying to rely 100% on the sun to meet its energy needs, climate scientists across the English Channel are preparing to turn down the sun.
Disclose TV reported on April 23 that “Experiments to 'dim sunlight to fight global warming' will be given the green light by the British government within weeks.”
Talk about working against your neighbor’s interests.
Solar and wind energy is currently wildly expensive — it can only survive through government subsidies. Oil, coal, and natural gas, on the other hand, do the opposite and contribute to state and federal coffers in the form of taxes.
Tech entrepreneur Elon Musk believes that eventually, all energy production will be solar generated, but it’s not perfected yet. Until then let’s rely on the tried and true — fossil fuels and nuclear.
Michael Dorstewitz is a retired lawyer and is a frequent contributor to Newsmax. He's also a former U.S. Merchant Marine officer and a Second Amendment supporter. Read Michael Dorstewitz's Reports — More Here.
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