Electricity supply back to normal in Portugal

Electricity has been restored to Portugal’s 6.4 million energy customers, who are now “connected as normal”, and there were no security or civil protection incidents during the night, the government said on Tuesday morning.

“We now have practically all services, including energy supply, restored”, Cabinet office minister António Leitão Amaro told Lusa.

According to the minister, in terms of electricity, the “country is now connected, with power restored to normal”, meaning that all 6.4 million customers have power, with the exception of 800 who have faults unrelated to yesterday’s the nationwide power outage.

Leitão Amaro also said that the water supply is working in practically the whole country, with only a few problems with pressure in “two or three districts” which will be “resolved quickly”.

With regard to transport, Leitão Amaro said that the “train services are running”, although some aspects of the operation still need to be stabilised due to the effects of the 24-hour strike that took place on Monday.

As for the Metro, the Cabinet office minister said that “it is also starting to get going”, although there was a disruption in Lisbon related to a data centre and not directly to the blackout.

As for the airports, “they are operational”, said Leitão Amaro, acknowledging that in the case of Lisbon, which was the most affected by the power failure, it should take two days for traffic to stabilise, but the systems are all operational.

The minister also said that, with regard to schools, the guidance issued during the night to all head teachers was to open and operate normally, except in cases where there may be specific safety reasons.

“Fuels are being supplied normally and there were no significant safety or civil protection incidents during the night in the country”, Leitão Amaro said, adding that the situation is also stable in the health services.

“Hospitals and health centres are in a position to operate normally in terms of supply and provisioning”, he assured.

“At this moment, what we can say is that the [energy] systems are stabilised, both in terms of transport and supply to consumers”, said the Cabinet office minister.