Huge power outage hits Brazil & Paraguay

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http://www.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUSTRE5AA07M20091111

SAO PAULO (Reuters) - Brazil's president denied on Wednesday that underinvestment was to blame for the worst power outage in a decade, which left a huge swath of the country in the dark for more than five hours and raised doubts about the reliability of its energy infrastructure.The blackout on Tuesday night left tens of millions of people without power across most of the country's wealthy southeastern region, halting subways and snarling traffic in major cities like Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro.
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Energy officials said it was likely caused when a storm downed three transmission lines carrying power from the giant Itaipu hydroelectric dam on Brazil's border with Paraguay, which supplies about 20 percent of Brazil's energy and 90 percent of Paraguay's.
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"The system is designed to withstand two contingencies ... here we had three," said Marcio Zimmermann, the ministry's executive secretary.

Zimmermann denied that the problem could have been caused by computer hackers. U.S. television network CBS reported in its "60 Minutes" program this month that blackouts in Brazil in 2005 and 2007 may have been caused by "cyber attacks," quoting mostly unnamed U.S. intelligence sources.
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The blackout on Tuesday affected 18 of Brazil's 26 states, including the capital Brasilia, and left all of Paraguay in the dark for about 15 minutes. Paraguay's state electricity company said that the problem originated in Brazilian power lines. Continued...