Latest news with #interconnector
Bloomberg
21-05-2025
- Business
- Bloomberg
Spain, Portugal Urge EU Effort on Power Link After Blackout
Spain and Portugal have called on the European Union to accelerate the completion of a cross-border power connection with the Iberian Peninsula after a recent blackout highlighted risks for the region's electricity supply. A planned interconnector with France must be 'urgently completed,' Spanish Energy Minister Sara Aagesen Munoz and her Portuguese counterpart Maria da Graca Carvalho wrote in a letter to EU energy chief Dan Jorgensen. The link operates at just 3% capacity, well below its planned 15% target for 2030, posing a systemic risk to the overall European energy system, they said.
Reuters
19-05-2025
- Business
- Reuters
France-UK electrical interconnector suspended until June 2, Channel tunnel operator says
May 19 (Reuters) - The electrical interconnector between France and Britain, ElecLink, will be suspended for two weeks until June 2 due to a slight misalignment of the cable, Channel tunnel operator Getlink ( opens new tab said on Monday. The issue was detected in a limited area outside the tunnel in Britain, Getlink said in a statement, estimating the commercial impact of the suspension would be around 20 million euros ($22.4 million). Operations at ElecLink, an underwater cable ensuring 1 gigawatt of electric capacity through the tunnel since 2022, had already been shut down last year after a fault was found in September. The interconnector was brought back into service in February. The current suspension has been implemented as a "precautionary measure" to carry out all necessary inspections and tests, Getlink said. It had signalled a 69% year-on-year drop in quarterly revenue for ElecLink in April, owing to the five-month suspension of activity and the normalisation of energy markets. ($1 = 0.8945 euros)
BreakingNews.ie
13-05-2025
- Business
- BreakingNews.ie
Speaker tells minister to offer ‘facts not opinions' when addressing Assembly
Stormont's speaker has cautioned a Sinn Féin minister against voicing policy opinions that contradict the official stance of her department. Edwin Poots accused Economy minister Caoimhe Archibald of making inappropriate comments in the chamber after she told MLAs she was supportive of the underground routing of cables required for the planned electricity interconnector linking the power grids in Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. Advertisement SDLP leader of the opposition, Matthew O'Toole, challenged the minister on her comments, highlighting that planning approval for the Northern Ireland section of the interconnector was granted on the basis of the cables being routed on overhead pylons. He said the Department for the Economy was a 'key delivery partner' for the project in its current form. Economy minister Caoimhe Archibald (Liam McBurney/PA) 'Are you saying one thing while your department is delivering another?' he asked. Ms Archibald earlier told MLAs that she voiced support for undergrounding the cables during a meeting with her counterpart in the Irish government, Transport, Climate, Environment and Energy minister Darragh O'Brien. Advertisement Responding to Mr O'Toole, Ms Archibald added: 'I don't agree with the member in respect of my comments, because I think I've been consistent in respect of my party's position, and the party has been consistent in respect of that position (undergrounding of cables), which would help secure community buy-in. 'And I think in respect of the planning permission (that) was granted by the previous Infrastructure minister (Nichola Mallon) who was your party colleague, and, as ministers in the Executive, we are obliged to fulfil the commitments in respect of that planning consent.' After Assembly question time concluded, Mr O'Toole raised Ms Archibald's comments with the Speaker. Responding, Mr Poots said it was important for ministers to deal with 'facts, not opinions'. Advertisement 'A minister may have an opinion, and if they think that opinion is important enough and they run the department, then it is up to them to change the position on the department,' he said. 'But it is a minister's task to come to the floor of the chamber and to represent the department's policies as they exist, and that's why I did indicate that we're here to hear facts, not to hear opinions. 'And if the minister wishes to change the position that the Department for the Economy has on whether the interconnector is underground or overground, then that's a matter for the minister. 'But she shouldn't be coming to the chamber and saying this is the department's position, this is my position. I don't think that that's appropriate.' Advertisement
Reuters
12-05-2025
- Business
- Reuters
Terna and IPTO sign 2-billion euro deal on Italy-Greece power connection
ROME, May 12 (Reuters) - Italian power grid operator Terna ( opens new tab and its Greek counterpart IPTO ( opens new tab signed on Monday a deal worth nearly 2 billion euros ($2.2 billion) on a new undersea electricity interconnector between Italy and Greece. The deal was announced after Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni hosted a summit with her Greek counterpart Kyriakos Mitsotakis at Rome's 17th-century Villa Doria Pamphili, also involving ministers from both countries. "(On interconnections) we have an advantage that comes from our geographical location in the Mediterranean, which has become central again in global dynamics, as the shortest route between the Atlantic and the Indo-Pacific," Meloni told reporters. The deal came after a huge blackout hitting Spain and Portugal last month raised questions over the resilience of the European power grid, prompting nations to seek to diversify routes and supplies. The new high-voltage link, named GRITA 2, will have a transmission capacity of up to 1,000 MW and span approximately 300 km in total, including around 240 km of subsea cable at depths of up to 1,000 metres, Terna said. "It will contribute to the achievement of decarbonization targets and strengthen the position of Italy and Greece as electricity hubs in the Mediterranean," the statement said, adding the two companies would invest 1.9 billion in the project. The new infrastructure - which on the Italian side will start from the south-eastern Puglia region - will operate alongside an existing interconnection which has been in place since 2002, with a 500 MW capacity. Greece's Mitsotakis also said a deal was struck between Italy's railway operator Ferrovie dello Stato (FS) and Athens' transport ministry for investments to improve railway safety in Greece, where a train crash killed 57 people in 2023. "In practice, it's about kickstarting a relationship... which was tested in the shadow of a big tragedy," the Greek leader said referring to that deal. Greece's Hellenic Train is a unit of Italy's FS. ($1 = 0.8990 euros)
Telegraph
07-05-2025
- Business
- Telegraph
Australian billionaire plots green energy revolution with power link to North Africa
An Australian mining billionaire is seeking support from Ed Miliband for a new multibillion-pound power link between Europe and North Africa. Andrew 'Twiggy' Forrest, the founder and boss of iron ore giant Fortescue, has held discussions with the Energy Secretary in recent weeks about the project, which would aim to pipe clean energy generated from African solar farms to the European Continent. Fortescue wants to develop up to 100 gigawatts (GW) of clean power capacity in North Africa, with talks ongoing with various European governments about running multiple subsea cables alongside one another to bring over electricity. These would be able to transport up to 500 terrawatt hours (TWh) of electricity per year, roughly equivalent to Germany's entire annual consumption or 17 Hinkley Point C-sized nuclear power stations operating round the clock. It would be backed up by battery storage and potentially hydrogen-fired power plants, ensuring the proposed interconnector could provide round-the-clock supplies and potentially support for system stability as well. Fortescue has yet to confirm the interconnector's route but it is understood that power for Britain would be transported via other intermediary Western European countries. The mining company last year signed a deal with Belgium-based offshore cable maker Jan de Nul to look at potential manufacturing facilities in Morocco. It is the latest business to look at tapping the vast solar power of North Africa, with a £25bn project proposed by rival Xlinks also vying for support from the Government. In an interview with The Telegraph, Mr Forrest said: 'You've got the most impossible amount of energy being wasted every single day in North Africa right now, so we're developing a proposal to send the equivalent of 500TW to Europe. 'And I really want to stress, this is not intermittent. It would be 24/7, baseload power, just like what I need to run my company. 'It can't run on wind and solar going up and down, it can't stop for Christmas, it can't stop for Easter. It has to go every second of every day. 'That's when we need power, and that's when Britain and Europe do as well.' Mr Forrest founded Fortescue in 2003 and built it into one of the world's biggest iron ore producers. But following a near-death experience in 2016, he became involved in environmentalism and vowed to transform his company into a green energy champion. He has argued his interconnector scheme can help to cut the power bills of European households and businesses while improving grid stability. The billionaire insisted he was not seeking subsidies from the Government but wanted a deal that would commit the UK to buying electricity at market prices over a set period of time. 'I want Ed [Miliband] to say, 'we'll buy X at market [prices],'' he said. By comparison, the rival scheme proposed by Xlinks, which is backed by former Tesco boss Sir Dave Lewis, is seeking a so-called contract for difference which would guarantee the project a fixed 'strike price' for the power it supplies. The Xlinks cable would transport solar and wind power generated in Morocco's Saharan Tan-Tan region to the Devon coast, via 4,000km of underwater cables. Mr Miliband has pledged to cut household energy bills by £300 a year and make Britain's electricity system 95pc 'clean' by 2030. His target includes increasing the capacity of interconnectors linked to the UK from 10GW currently to up to 14GW. Iberian blackouts The Fortescue proposal has emerged just weeks after Spain and Portugal suffered unprecedented national blackouts, with electricity grid stability now high on the agenda. Some experts have raised concerns that cascading failures in the Spanish system, the cause of which are still unknown, may have been worsened by a reliance on renewable energy sources. This is because many solar and wind farms do not tend to provide so-called system inertia – the spinning momentum that turbines generate as a by-product – which can add to grid instability when there are sudden changes in supply and demand. Supply and demand must be kept balanced at all times on electricity systems for the lights to stay on. In the wake of the Spanish crisis, experts have also highlighted the relatively low number of interconnectors between the Iberian peninsula and the rest of the Continent. A key link with France went offline as the blackouts spread and automatic systems kicked in to protect vital infrastructure from being damaged.
