On 28 September a power line in Switzerland struck a tree and plunged most of Italy's population of 55 million into a major blackout. Electricity was quickly restored in the north of the country, but Rome was without electricity for 12 hours, and parts of the south of Italy were disconnected for over 24 hours.
It is thought that storm debris from the tree caused a flashover with a major line carrying power from Switzerland to Italy, which caused over-capacity on lines from France to Italy, resulting in a domino-like collapse. Swiss officials said that Italy had been too slow to respond to warnings about the problem.
Etrans, co-ordinator of the Swiss transmission network, said that it alerted Italian operators about the downed line, and advised them to increase their own production to compensate, but that their reaction was too slow, resulting in other lines from France, Switzerland, Austria and Slovenia becoming overloaded and eventually disconnected. However, the Italian industry minister Antonio Marzano said that the blackout was not Italy's fault, but was caused by events outside Italy. He called for a vote on a bill to increase existing electrical generation capacity by 25%.
The Italian prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi, said that the Italian government was preparing to rush into law a special blackout decree to allow the swift construction of new power stations. It is also being said that the government intends to give state-controlled energy groups Eni and Enel one year to sell off their gas and electricity distribution networks.
The government decree will be aimed at eliminating bureaucratic delays and permitting an extensive and rapid building programme. It hopes that liberalisation of the transmission market will encourage foreign investment into the sector.
Italy currently relies on imports for 17% of its power.
Italian environmental groups have called for the resignation of Andrea Bollino, chairman of Italian grid company Gestore della Rete di Transmissione Nazionale.
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