How does the Netherlands get near power cuts: Citizens are being asked to use less electricity

In a Dutch government campaign called “Flip the Switch”, the actress warns viewers of their electricity consumption.

When we all use electricity at the same time, our power grid is overloaded. This can cause failure. So, use as little electricity as possible between four and nine”, the campaign says, the BBC reports.

It is a sign that, in one of the most advanced economies in the world, something has gone wrong with the country's energy supply.

The Netherlands has been an enthusiastic booster of electric cars and has the highest number of gas stations per capita in Europe.

When it comes to producing electricity, the Netherlands has replaced gas from its wide reserves of the North Sea with wind and solar energy so much that it leads Europe in the number of solar panels per person. In fact, more than a third of Dutch homes have installed solar panels.

The country also intends that by 2030, the open-sea eolitic parks will be its largest energy source.

All this is good from an environmental perspective, but it puts the Dutch national power grid under great pressure and has had several power cuts in recent years.

The problem is the overload of the” network, says Kees-Jan Rameau, executive director of Dutch energy producer and supplier Eneco, who now receives 70% of the electricity from solar and wind energy.

“Network closing is like a network traffic jam. It is caused either by excessive demand for energy in a certain area or by many energy coming online, more than the network can afford”, he said.

The problem, he explains, is that the network was designed at a time when there were only a few huge, mostly gas power plants.

So we built a network of very large transmission lines near those thermal power plants, and increasingly small transmission lines as you get closer to families. Today we are moving to renewable energy sources, which means that a lot of energy is being injected into networks on the outskirts of the network where only relatively small transmission lines are available. ”

And these small transmission lines are trying to afford all the electricity coming from wind turbines and solar panels scattered throughout the country.

Damiann Ernst, an electrical engineering professor at Liezhi University in Belgium, is one of Europe's leading experts on electricity networks. He says it's a costly problem the Netherlands has to solve.

“They have a network crisis because they haven't invested enough in their distribution networks, in their transmission networks, so they are facing obstacles everywhere, and it will take years and billions of dollars to solve this”, he says.

Professor Ernst adds that there is a problem throughout Europe.

The solar panels are being installed in large numbers and installed at a very, very fast speed to cope with the network. ”

At Eneco headquarters in Rotterdam, Kees-Jan Rameau shows a large control panel that the company calls the virtual power plant “and “our business body”. It's used to balance the network, avoiding power cuts.

When electricity production in the Netherlands is very high, this allows Enec to turn off wind turbines and solar panels.

When demand for electricity is too high, electricity shuts down customers who have agreed to let Enec stop or reduce their power supply when the network is underloaded in exchange for lower prices.

“Network closure is endangering the future of the Dutch chemical industry, while it will be easier to invest in other countries”, says Nienke Homan, president of the Dutch Chemical Association.

She adds that after the 2015 Paris Agreement to combat climate change, “became very focused on increased production of renewable energy. But somehow we underestimated the impact it would have on the power grid. ”

Tennet now plans to spend 200 billion euros on network strengthening, including extending about 100,000 kilometers of new cable by 2050.

That's a lot of money, but there's a big price to pay if you don't invest. Network overload costs the Dutch economy up to 35 billion euros a year, according to a 2024 report by the Boston Consulting Group management consultancy.

Eugene Bayings, who is responsible for the network overload at Tennet, says patience is badly needed.

To strengthen and strengthen the network, we need to double, triple and sometimes ten times the capacity of the existing network. ”

And on average, it takes about 10 years for such a project to be implemented before it is operational, of which the first eight are legislative adjustments and the right to place cables on the ground with all property owners. And the last two years are the construction period. ”

He adds that, meanwhile, the energy transition is going so fast that the Netherlands cannot afford it, with its existing network.

Financial stimuli for people supplying excessive solar energy to the network has been reduced to almost zero. In some cases, people will even have to pay to supply solar energy to the network.

But for families and companies wanting to increase their electricity consumption with a new or larger connection to the network, this is increasingly simply impossible.

“Consumers often want to install a heat pump or load their electric vehicle into the house, but this requires a much larger power connection and more and more they simply cannot get it”, says Kees-Jan Rameau.

He adds it is worse for businesses. “They often want to expand their business and simply cannot get additional capacity from the network operator. ”

And it has reached a point where building new settlements in the Netherlands is becoming increasingly difficult because it simply does not have the capacity to connect these new sites to the network.

Many of them, both individuals and companies, end up on waiting lists for several years. At the same time, there are waiting lists for those who want to supply the power grid, such as a new house equipped with solar panels on the roof.

Tennet, the state agency running the national network, says 8,000 companies are currently waiting to be allowed to supply electricity, while another 12,000 are waiting for permission to use more energy.

Some sectors of the Dutch economy warn it is hindering their growth.

The network block is putting the future of the Dutch chemical industry at risk, while it will be easier to invest in other countries”, says Nienke Homan, president of the Dutch Chemical Association.