German Civil Protection Agency Says Outages Unlikely After Official Warns of ‘Big Winter Blackouts’

BERLIN (Sputnik) - Germany’s Federal Office of Civil Protection and Disaster Assistance (BBK) said on Sunday that large-scale power outages in the country are unlikely.

BBK President Ralph Tiesler said on Saturday that German citizens may experience power cuts both due to energy shortages and as a result of a "targeted, temporary shutdown of the grid by the operators" to protect the entire network.

"A major blackout in Germany is highly unlikely. The power supply system is designed with multiple redundancies and multiple safety features to stabilize the power system in case of failures," BBK said in a statement on Twitter.

In addition, the likelihood of regional and temporary forced outages to further ensure the reliability of the general supply is "considered low," according to the statement.

BBK clarified that Tiesler mentioned such a scenario to emphasize the fundamental importance of precautions.

Western countries and their allies have been facing a massive energy crisis and struggling to fill their gas reserves in time for the heating season in the aftermath of imposing sanctions on Russia after it launched a military operation in Ukraine on February 24. The sanctions and the military operation resulted in significant disruptions in supply chains and a spike in energy prices worldwide.