Apostolos Tomaras
Serious questions have emerged following the widespread power cuts across the government-controlled areas last Friday and Saturday.
Even now, there is still no clear picture of what led the Cyprus Transmission System Operator to cut the electricity supply to prevent the entire grid from collapsing in a blackout.
Officially, both the Transmission System Operator and the Electricity Authority of Cyprus blamed Friday’s disruption on a loss of communication between large photovoltaic parks and the Electricity Distribution Control Centre.
According to the EAC, the control center could no longer monitor how much solar energy was being generated, upsetting the balance between electricity production and demand.
However, the EAC’s official explanation—later adopted by the Transmission System Operator—conflicts with unofficial information obtained by Kathimerini from sources both within the operator and the EAC.
Both sources attributed the disruption in the government-controlled areas to the electricity network in the occupied north, which is permanently connected to the Republic’s system as part of confidence-building measures.
They claimed the network in the north had lost a large share of its own electricity production and consequently drew a corresponding amount from the system in the government-controlled areas, destabilizing it in the process.
The EAC officially rejected this account, insisting that Friday’s problem was caused by “a temporary loss of telecommunications links between large photovoltaic parks and the Electricity Distribution Control Centre.”
Yet the explanation the EAC initially rejected was cited just one day later, when the electricity problems continued.
Answers are needed
The official explanations cannot be regarded as the end of the matter. On the contrary, they raise a series of questions that remain unanswered, involving both the information provided to the public and the safeguards intended to prevent similar incidents.
That is true even if the official version—that communication was lost with the photovoltaic parks—is accepted. The explanation is not entirely convincing, particularly as there appears to be no evidence of similar incidents occurring in the past.
If the source of the disruption lies in the electricity network in the occupied north, the questions also take on a political dimension. The interconnection forms part of confidence-building measures, and decisions to supply electricity from the government-controlled areas are made at the political level.
Electricity as a confidence-building measure
Sources with detailed knowledge of how electricity is supplied from the government-controlled areas to the occupied north told Kathimerini that a failure in either network can drag the other one down with it.
Although the two systems are permanently interconnected, any request from the north for electricity is formally subject to a political decision by the Republic.
Regarding last Friday’s incident, EAC sources told Kathimerini that no request for electricity had been submitted by the north. They did not, however, rule out the possibility that a sudden failure there caused a chain reaction that also affected the network in the government-controlled areas.
Turkish Cypriot media reported power cuts in the north last Friday, fully adopting the EAC’s account.
In its report, Kıbrıs Postası referred to “a failure in the solar energy system in southern Cyprus that caused the power outage.”
According to the Turkish Cypriot outlet, the north’s protection system responded automatically to protect itself, shutting down its own generators at Teknecik and Kalecik and leaving the area without electricity.
The same explanation was repeated by the Turkish Cypriot side regarding Saturday’s power cuts. The EAC, however, attributed those outages to a fault in the network in the occupied north.
The blame game
The conflicting accounts have created a blame game over which network dragged the other one down.
Regardless of where the original failure occurred, reasonable questions remain about the safety protocols governing both networks and whether adequate safeguards exist to prevent one problem from triggering another.
Another issue raising concern is the political decision to keep the two networks permanently connected at a time when electricity supply in the government-controlled areas is already operating close to its limits. A similar disruption could happen again at any time.
At the same time, the political significance of including electricity in confidence-building measures connected to the Cyprus problem should not be overlooked.
The EAC
As far as the EAC is concerned, its decision to take responsibility for the entire problem cannot go unnoticed—nor can its admission that there is no backup communication system linking the control center to the photovoltaic parks.
Beyond a broad and vague reference to problems affecting an unspecified number of solar parks, the EAC provided no further details.
It did not say, for example, whether similar telemetry failures had occurred in the past or identify the telecommunications provider whose services it uses.
When Kathimerini asked for clarification, the EAC replied: “The causes are still under investigation, which is why we do not wish to say anything further at this stage.”
The answer is surprising because the question concerned the identity of the telecommunications provider, not information about the cause of the disruption.
Kathimerini also asked Cyta whether the semi-governmental organization provides telecommunications services to the EAC. Cyta replied that it did not know.
