Reacción a "What is known about the role of renewable energies in the blackout on the Iberian Peninsula "

The causes are still unknown and seem to be multifactorial. What role did renewables play in this blackout?

“Everything points to a combination of factors that led to the major blackout. I would like to emphasize that, personally, I do not believe that renewables were the cause of the problem. The only thing is that, due to their operation and connection requirements, they were quickly disconnected for safety reasons, which caused the energy imbalance and the outage to become even worse. It has been identified that some photovoltaic plants could have potentially disconnected 3 and 1.5 seconds before the blackout. It has also been seen that several minutes before, there was a low-frequency oscillation in the power grid, which, depending on its magnitude, could have led to the activation of grid protections. However, we still do not know for certain what caused them to disconnect. In addition, as is well known, renewable energies currently operate as grid following, which means that in order to function, they need to synchronize (rise) to the frequency of the grid, and when this is not available, they cannot enter or operate correctly.

How could something like this be prevented from happening again?

“First, in order to prevent something, we need to identify exactly what happened. But we must bear in mind that, given the high level of renewables we have, we will have to ask them to be responsible for helping the system with additional controls to support the grid, including inertia, among others; and that the option of switching from grid following to grid forming should be considered in order to help restore the grid. In addition, we would need to increase energy storage systems in the grid to ensure its continuous balance. Another important point is to reduce the energy island effect of the peninsular grid by connecting more with France or Morocco, as this greater interconnection can provide assistance in the event of problems. It should be remembered that we currently have around 5% of connections outside the peninsula, and it is usually recommended to have at least 10%.”