Bankinter || Sara Aagesen, third vice president and minister for Ecological Transition, presented the final report of the investigation commission into the blackout of 28 April yesterday. The report indicates that the cause of the blackout “was multifactorial”. The system failed because either “there was insufficient programming (responsibility of Redeia), or because “there was no capacity to absorb overvoltage in the system despite it being required”. This is the responsibility of major energy companies, such as Iberdrola, Endesa, and Naturgy, which have plants of sufficient size to act in that manner. The report also mentions that it could have been a combination of both situations, especially the second one, highlighting, as it did weeks ago, problems in Granada, Seville, and Badajoz, precisely where Iberdrola and Endesa have some large plants, as does Naturgy. The Government rules out the theory of a cyberattack. The report will now be sent to the National Commission of Markets and Competition (CNMC), which also has authority in the matter to continue investigating and then to the courts.
Opinion of the analysis team: The Government shares responsibilities with its ruling on a “multifactorial phenomenon”. On one hand, it limits Redeia's responsibility to insufficient planning. On the other, it points to the major energy companies for failing to fulfil the task of regulating the network's voltage. Good news in principle for Redeia as it does not appear in the report as the sole responsible party, although the report has no legal validity nor is it a final resolution. Now it is the turn of the CNMC and later the courts. The most likely scenario is that the legal battle will be long and complex. As for potential compensations, depending on who is determined to be at fault, they will be borne by certain companies or, in any case, by the insurers they have contracted.