The sunny and windy weather of Easter Monday helped Belgium produce a peak in electricity production. With solar panels and wind turbines working at full stretch and the country on holiday a gigantic energy surplus of over 1,000 megawatts was created – around one seventh of normal consumption.
The solution was to sell the surplus to France. The company that manages Belgium’s electricity grid Elia requested a number of power stations to stop producing for a time but still left room for a highly profitable sale of the excess.
Over the winter there were frequent warnings about possible power shortage yet as soon as the sun started to shine, there was suddenly excess power.
The situation regarding electricity supply could still become critical next winter, Elia warns.
