After an in-house investiagion, German utility E.ON AG said on Nov. 14 that the European-wide blackout that occurred on Nov. 4 was a result of human error, not any technical malfunctions. The power outage left millions in the dark in parts of Germany, France, Belgium, Italy, Portugal and Spain.

The blackout occurred after E.ON turned off a high-voltage transmission line over a river in Germany in an aborted attempt to allow a newly built Norwegian cruise ship to pass safely under it.

E.ON did not make public the exact error, but did report that “owing to time pressure, an E.ON control center had not made use of all technical options for a comprehensive situation analysis.”

“These incidents show, once again, that events in one part of Europe impact on other parts and again confirm the need for a proper European energy policy,” stated European Union Energy Commissioner Andris Piebalgs.

E.ON has submitted its findings in a report to Germany's Federal Network Agency. Piebalgs has asked the Union for the Coordination of Transmission of Electricity and the European Transmission System Operators to establish the precise cause of the blackout and establish measures to ensure such an event will not happen again.