It won’t be weeks, but it won’t be hours either. The president of E-redes doesn’t risk a date, not even indicative, but promised that the re-energization of the network “is coming soon”. The process will begin with the substations and the high-voltage network.
“From the moment the high voltage is available,I believe we will have energy very soon,” José Ferrari Careto told RTP – as he did during this crisis – but warned that after that “the cause (of the recovery) of the service will be long. Getting 100% of the energy back will take a long time.”
Among the resources being mobilized, there are about 80 generators installed with 200 available, and there is also a mobile power plant that has just been installed.It’s a kind of super-generator, it runs on diesel, but with much more power. This mobile power plant, which was transported on a TIR truck, allows replacing one of the substations that is not operational, allowing injecting energy into the low-voltage network. It is indeed the low voltage that serves end customers,families and businesses. But for that, it is necessary to first revive the high-voltage network. All efforts are focused on this priority.
The electrical network, explained the president of E-Redes to RTP, works in a cascade and begins to be powered at the very high voltage level – the transmission network managed by REN (Redes Energéticas Nacionais) talso was very affected, but the recovery was faster – than following to high voltage and then medium and low voltage.