Sri Lanka faces islandwide power failure linked to solar surplus

A nationwide power outage struck Sri Lanka on Saturday after the national transmission network collapsed, leaving the entire island without electrical supply for over two hours.

State-operated utility Electricity Distribution Lanka reported that technicians were attempting to address a major failure impacting the wider grid. Officials indicated that the disruption likely occurred when the volume of solar electricity fed into the network surpassed actual demand, triggering the tripping of system infrastructure. There was initially no definitive schedule provided for when power would return completely across the country.

Energy Minister Anura Karunathilaka explained that utility teams planned to bring the network back online in phases. In an official release, he urged property owners equipped with rooftop solar installations to temporarily decouple their setups from the system, noting that reducing incoming feed would assist emergency personnel in stabilizing the transmission network.

The breakdown echoes a similar nationwide shutdown that took place in February 2025. During that previous incident, an overabundance of solar energy on a sunny weekend similarly overwhelmed consumer demand, requiring more than six hours before electrical connections were fully re-established.

Sri Lanka currently maintains a solar generation capacity exceeding 3,000 megawatts, yet typical daytime electrical usage throughout the country hovers between 2,000 and 2,500 megawatts. Favorable tax incentives introduced by authorities have prompted widespread adoption of private solar arrays, allowing individuals to transmit unused power back into the public network.

These feed-in arrangements have generated recurring technical challenges for grid operators attempting to balance fluctuating supply and demand. Despite these operational hurdles, the Sri Lankan government is pursuing plans to expand total solar capacity to approximately 4,400 megawatts within three years, marking a substantial increase compared to 2024 levels.