Spain's grid operator to release own report on April blackout
A report released on Tuesday by the government said a failure by the operator to calculate the correct mix of energy was one of the factors hindering the grid's ability to cope with a surge in voltage that led to the outage.
The grid's operations chief Concha Sanchez said the system was in "absolutely normal conditions" at noon just before the blackout.
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Reuters
13 hours ago
- Reuters
Madrid's poor neighbourhoods clamour for more trees to cool streets in deadly heatwaves
MADRID, Aug 20 (Reuters) - As Madrid sweltered at the peak of one of Spain's longest-ever heatwaves, the temperature on a street in one of its poorest neighbourhoods - Puente de Vallecas - measured 41.4 degrees Celsius (106.5 Fahrenheit) by early afternoon. A few hundred metres down the street it was 38.6 C. The difference? One section of the street was treeless while the other was shaded by a row of leafy mulberries. According to scientific studies, trees can play a key role in mitigating the often-deadly effects of heatwaves and as temperatures in Spain rise as a result of global warming they may play a crucial role in helping to regulate temperatures. However, activist groups say that Madrid has been losing tree cover, particularly in some of its poorer neighbourhoods, and are pushing the mayor to plant more. 'The difference between having or not having trees on your street has an immediate impact on your health,' said Manuel Mercadal, a member of activist group Sustainable Vallekas, which has been measuring temperature differences on Vallecas's streets to raise awareness. San Diego, a part of Puente de Vallecas, registered some of the highest temperatures in Madrid, according to a Polytechnic University of Madrid study, which identified so-called "urban heat islands" where temperatures were as much as 8 C higher than in other parts of the city, such as parks. The heat is exacerbated by a lack of air conditioning because many households can't afford it, said Pablo Chivato, a coordinator of the neighbourhood association for Puente de Vallecas. More frequent heatwaves are taking their toll on elderly patients, especially those with underlying cardiac problems, said Antonio Cabrera, a family doctor at a primary care centre in La Elipa in southeastern Madrid. "Higher mortality rates were traditionally associated with winter in European countries. Nowadays, for people aged 80–90 with multiple health conditions, this is the time of year when many of them die," Cabrera said. As temperatures rise, trees have become a political issue. Madrid's Mayor Jose Luis Martinez-Almeida has clashed with activists over trees since taking power in 2019, particularly over plans to cut down more than 1,000 trees for the extension of a metro line. Official data show that while the total number of trees has increased by 2.4% under Almeida's watch, that was mostly in the expanding middle-income districts in the city's east. All except one of the southern districts lost trees. Puente de Vallecas has lost 1,314 trees or 3% of its total tree cover since 2019. Some of the loss was caused by a heavy snowstorm in 2021 that killed 80,000 trees. But many are also felled as the city embarks on construction projects. The mayor's office didn't respond to a request for comment. Left-wing party Mas Madrid has pledged to plant 75,000 more trees so that the city has one tree every seven metres (23 feet). The law used to stipulate that felled trees must be replaced, but a recent reform means local councils in certain circumstances can create a fund into which to pay what it would have cost to plant new trees, said Lola Mendez of the environmental group Ecologists in Action. Almeida's office said it has planted nearly 40,000 trees in empty tree pits under a plan announced in 2022. Data published by the city in 2023 showed 1,318 trees were planted in Puente de Vallecas, but that 719 empty tree pits were covered over. The city hasn't published more recent data. Chivato said his neighbourhood association worked with the mayor's office to plant trees in 75% of empty tree pits in the Puente de Vallecas neighbourhood of San Diego. But many remain empty.
The Guardian
6 days ago
- The Guardian
Wildfires claim third life in Spain as intense heat continues across Europe
Wildfires raging across Spain have killed a third person as intense heat continues across vast swathes of Europe, forcing overwhelmed governments to call in support from their neighbours. The European Commission said it was sending water-bombing planes to Spain as it struggled to contain deadly blazes, with countries across the Balkans also receiving firefighting support. A volunteer firefighter died after battling a blaze in Castile and León, authorities said on Thursday, after the death of a fellow volunteer in the same region on Tuesday. A man died on the outskirts of Madrid on Monday as he tried to save horses from a burning stable. 'Death strikes us again with the loss of a second volunteer who has lost their life in León,' Spain's prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, said on Thursday. He thanked the 'heroes' protecting people from fires and said 'the threat remains extreme'. In Patras, Greece's third-largest city, firefighters pushed back a wildfire that had burned through the outskirts of the port and forced the evacuation of a children's hospital and a retirement home. Local media reported that a 19-year-old man who had allegedly confessed to starting the blaze was among a number of arrests made in connection to it. The Greek fire service spokesperson, Vasilios Vathrakoyannis, said the general situation had improved on all fronts after an all-night battle, but that a very high fire risk was still predicted for most areas of the country. 'Today is expected to be a very difficult day,' he said. Spain said it had deployed 1,000 military personnel and 50 aerial resources to tackle the fires, having become the fifth country in a week to activate the EU's civil protection mechanism to fight the fires. The European Commission announced that two planes stationed in France were expected to be deployed in Spain on Thursday. Greece is expected to receive two Swedish helicopters stationed in Bulgaria under the mechanism, which it activated on Tuesday, while Bulgaria, Albania and Montenegro – where a soldier died fighting a fire near the capital – have also received support from firefighters from several EU countries. The EU's civil protection mechanism, which coordinates responses during wars and other crises, has been activated 16 times during the current fire season. The number of activations in 2025 is already the same as the figure for the whole of the 2024 fire season, the commission said. Wildfires have burned more than 500,000 hectares in Europe so far this year, according to official data, an increase of 134% compared with the average over the past two decades. France experienced its largest wildfire since 1949 last week. The two Spanish firefighters who died were using brush cutters to slow the spread of a fire when they were engulfed by the flames on Tuesday afternoon, according to the Spanish daily El País. The fire is poised to become one of the largest in the country's history. Strong and variable winds spread flames that trapped the two men, the newspaper reported. One man died within a few hours, while the other, who suffered 85% burns, died after a day in hospital. Six people remain in hospital in the region with burns and serious injuries, local media reported. Sign up to This is Europe The most pressing stories and debates for Europeans – from identity to economics to the environment after newsletter promotion The deadly fires come as southern Europe suffers intense heat that has broken temperature records across the continent – made worse by fossil fuel pollution that traps sunlight and heats the planet – and which has dried out vegetation. 'It's obvious that climate change is exacerbating the severity of fires,' said Eduardo Rojas Briales, a forestry researcher at the Polytechnic University of Valencia and former deputy director general of the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization. 'But it's not responsible to wait for greenhouse gas emissions to drop … as the sole approach to addressing the problem.' He called for additional policies such as ensuring dead plant material is kept at manageable levels, creating gaps in vegetation, for instance through reversing rural abandonment, and using prescribed burning. 'There is no alternative but to build landscapes … that are truly resilient to fires,' he said. A report published on Thursday by XDI, a climate risk analysis group, found that the climate crisis has doubled the risk of infrastructure damage from forest fires in France, Italy, Greece, Romania and Bulgaria since 1990. It predicted risk would increase further still in future. 'We're all asking ourselves, how much worse can it get?' said Karl Mallon, XDI's head of science and technology. 'According to our latest analysis, a lot.'
The Guardian
6 days ago
- The Guardian
Southern Europe bakes and burns, turning holiday hotspots into infernos
Somehow, the heat hits harder when you're on holiday. Tourists who hoped to idle on Croatian beaches this week will have instead singed their feet on scorching sand. Families on a break in Madrid will have choked on smoke from a deadly wildfire that ripped through a suburb of the Spanish capital. Visitors to Mount Vesuvius in Italy will have been turned away from the trails as firefighters battled blazes on the volcano's slopes. And then there are campers in south-west France, where 40% of selected weather stations recorded heat above 40C on Monday, who may have wished they had stayed home. Fierce heat is scorching southern Europe for the second time this summer, breaking temperature records and fuelling wildfires that have forced thousands of people across several countries to flee their homes. The heatwave, which has been made longer and stronger by the blanket of fossil fuel pollution that smothers the Earth, has struck during the holiday season when tourist-dependent economies in the Mediterranean and the Balkans are most exposed to variations in weather. For locals and visitors alike, the formerly Instagram-friendly views now seem apocalyptic. Firefighters are tackling fierce blazes in countries from Portugal to Turkey, and the infernos are known to have killed people in France, Spain, Albania, Montenegro and Greece. Across the continent, black smoke is darkening blood-red skies. 'We are being cooked alive,' said Alexandre Favaios, the mayor of Vila Real, in northern Portugal. 'This cannot continue.' Wildfires in Europe burned more than 400,000 hectares in the first seven months of 2025, according to data published by EU fire scientists on Tuesday. Although it is not the worst the continent has seen for this time of year, the burned area is 87% greater than the average over the last two decades. In the coming week, the scientists warned, 'extreme to very extreme conditions' for fire weather will persist. They project 'particularly severe' risks in much of southern Europe, as well as high anomalies in parts of the Nordics. 'We are at extreme risk of forest fires,' the Spanish prime minister Pedro Sánchez warned on Tuesday. 'Please be very cautious.' Feeling the heat I have felt the fear that wildfires can instil in an absent-minded tourist. At a Portuguese friend's wedding in 2022, by a lake in the rural centre of the country, a nearby forest fire forced us to head indoors early so helicopters could fill buckets with fresh water to battle the blaze. The next day, as we lounged in the outdoor pool of a holiday home, white soot rained down on us like snow. Sign up to This is Europe The most pressing stories and debates for Europeans – from identity to economics to the environment after newsletter promotion The hot ashes had been lifted up by plumes of smoke that grew redder and redder as the fire came closer. After some fretting among the group, one friend with a newborn baby decided it was time to leave, so we fled to the coast. We drove past locals, mostly retired, who stood outside their homes and watched in horror as flames drew near. Wildfires kill hundreds of people around the world each year – a death toll far lower than that from floods, which kill thousands, and from heatwaves, which kill hundreds of thousands. But factor in the smoke and the human cost rises rapidly. The latest research estimates that the air pollution spewed by wildfires kills a staggering 1.5 million people globally each year. There are economic costs, too. As southern Europe bakes and burns each summer, tourists who cannot travel out of season are starting to abandon traditional holiday destinations in favour of 'coolcations' farther north that beat the heat. Even that strategy will have led to some disappointment this summer. At the start of the month, a heatwave hit cool Nordic countries and sent temperatures north of the Arctic Circle to a staggering 32-33C. 'Truly unprecedented' was how one meteorologist described the heatwave. The upshot is that flight shame might not be what keeps people from holidaying far from home as the planet heats up. Instead, it could be the rising cost of travel as Europe's once-stable climate violently breaks down. This is an edited version of the This is Europe newsletter. If you want to read the complete version every Wednesday, please sign up here.
