On April 28th, 2025, the majority of the Iberian Peninsula experienced an unprecedented blackout. Early rumors of Cyberattacks, Weather Phenomena, and even Atmospheric Disturbances, have all been ruled out by local authorities. The current theory is that an interconnection issue between France and Spain caused a frequency rise that triggered the automatic shutdown of substations and renewable generators resulting in a sudden loss of 15 gigawatts of power to the grid in just 5 seconds. This led to a “strong oscillation” in the European grid, causing Spain’s system to disconnect from the broader European network, particularly from France, resulting in a collapse of the Iberian electricity network.
The trickledown effect to the everyday lives of Europeans and tourists in the area was substantial. There are many stories of stranded rail and air travelers with no access to cash, food, or water. ATMs weren’t working and credit card transactions were impossible to process since the digital network lost power to critical servers. Mobile carriers also lost power to their cellular data networks leaving users unable to communicate or access important alerts and updates using their mobile devices.
In the US, our electrical infrastructure is just as out of date and overtaxed as the grid on the Iberian Peninsula. In fact, it may be more vulnerable since we do not have the high percentage of renewable generation that Europe does. As a data center operator or facilities manager, there is nothing you can do to prevent an outage of the scale seen in Portugal, Spain, and Southwestern France this week. But there are steps you can take to ensure user-connectivity to your critical networks in times of crisis.
Keep your Users Connected with an Emergency Back-up Power Plan
For a long-duration power outage, generator back-up power is the best option. But to avoid a hard shut-down of critical servers and network equipment while waiting for the generator to come online, UPS back-up is the best option. Smaller UPS such as the Smart-UPS Online are best-in-class for back-up power in the rack to keep servers and networking gear powered and online in the event of a sudden power outage. Some Smart-UPS models are available with extended runtimes or lithium-ion batteries, such as the compact Smart-UPS Ultra, for longer life. This extensive product line has a solution appropriate for just about any application.
Maintaining users’ connectivity to the network is quickly becoming the top priority for almost every organization and we can help develop an emergency back-up power plan to suit the needs of your facilities. For more information and assistance selecting a Smart-UPS for your critical applications, call us at 800-876-9373, or email [email protected].