Five soft coal units at two thermal power plants in Germany, owned by the electricity giant RWE Power, had to be disconnected from the grid around eight in the evening on Tuesday after a sabotage attack on an electrical substation in Rommerskirchen, near Cologne. Although electricity supply to consumers was not affected at any time, for one hour a gap equivalent to 4,200 million watts was generated, which was compensated with reserves and alternative sources, causing the so-called deviation price to skyrocket.
The coincidence with another similar incident that occurred hours earlier at the opposite end of the country, when unknown individuals damaged transmission lines with homemade projectiles and forced temporary shutdowns at another coal plant, in this case in Jänschwalde, in the state of Brandenburg, raises suspicions that both incidents constitute a coordinated attack with the participation of a foreign power.
Russia intensifies hybrid attacks on Europe and converts them into the new normal, according to the analysis presented in the article. German authorities are investigating the possibility that the two attacks are related and that they were perpetrated by foreign agents, in a context of growing tension between Russia and European countries.
