France, Portugal, and Spain to Discuss Accelerating Power Links

By Kate Abnett

BRUSSELS (Reuters) -France, Portugal and Spain will hold talks in the coming weeks on how to speed up power interconnector projects, Portugal's energy minister told Reuters, as the country pushes to improve electricity links following a huge blackout in April.

Spain and Portugal's poor electricity connections to the rest of Europe were highlighted by the countries' unprecedented power outage in April, which experts said could have been less severe if the Iberian Peninsula had more interconnectors to exchange power with other countries.

"After the blackout, we have put extra pressure on the European Commission and on France, together with Spain, and as a result of that contact the French government has asked for a meeting," Maria da Graca Carvalho said in an interview. She said the talks would take place in early October.

Carvalho said she was hopeful France was willing to speed up projects, particularly after the European Investment Bank said it will support the planned Bay of Biscay power interconnector project between Spain and France with 1.6 billion euros ($1.88 billion).

"They are good signs," she said, adding that an environmental assessment of the Bay of Biscay link must be completed before the project could move ahead.

France's energy ministry did not respond to a request for comment. Spain's energy ministry declined to comment on the meeting.

Grid and power plant operators have traded barbs over who was to blame for Iberia's massive blackout in April, while the EU investigation into its cause is still ongoing.

The European network of transmission system operators ENTSO-E is due to publish part of its investigation on Friday, confirming the conditions in the network when the outage began.

Works to strengthen an existing interconnector between France and Spain are expected to wrap this year, while the Bay of Biscay link is set to be completed by 2028.

Spain and Portugal have previously said France has held up new interconnectors. French grid operator RTE has assessed two additional links with Spain over the Pyrenees, but noted that the projects' beneficiaries would be located outside of France.

Iberia has just 3% of its electricity capacity connected to European neighbours, far below the EU's target for countries to reach 15% by 2030.

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(Reporting by Kate Abnett; additional reporting by Pietro Lombardi in Madrid, America Hernandez in Paris; Editing by Susan Fenton)