Editorial: Power cuts are what ‘later’ looks like

Thousands of Maltese households spent successive nights without power in a sweltering July heat which has now assumed a recognisable pattern since the first major nationwide power cuts of July 2023.

Back then, Enemalta’s failure to invest in its high voltage network over a 10-year span – despite growing demand – was one reason for the nationwide outages that took the administration, so keen on energy policy, by surprise.

Of course, when Energy Minister Miriam Dalli adduces the cause of these debilitating outages to extreme temperatures and record demand, she is not wrong; except that this is not something that could not be predicted by a government that presided on overpopulation, overtourism and Malta’s fabled dependence on the construction industry.

Extreme weather is now the new baseline in an era condemned to the ravages of the climate crisis created by man-made economic growth and fossil-fuel dependence. Across Malta, Storm Harry had already demonstrated what climate volatility means for a small island and its businesses and agriculture. The summer heat that trapped the island in the last weeks was no freak occurrence from a capricious atmosphere. It is the predictable consequence of a climate trajectory the entire planet is condemned to.

But as far as the localised problem goes, the list of affected localities that had to endure sleepless nights in the heat, betrays not only Enemalta’s shortcomings, but the systemic punishment this island is inflicting upon itself.

Perhaps it is not just the energy grid that was not designed for this load. It is the island itself – Malta – that has consciously taken a line of flight that will bring a disastrous comeuppance

Malta added 46,000 vehicles to its roads in the last electoral cycle, building 6,000 new apartments every year, and receives four million tourists annually. Its population stands at just over 588,000. Everybody understands that all these accretions, a symptom of wanton economic progress and profit, creates voracious demand for fossil fuels and electricity infrastructure – for air conditioning in office buildings and new apartments, for charging points for the electrification of the car fleet and cruise liner berths, and for the cooling systems of hotels and restaurants serving a tourism economy which, enabled by low-cost aviation and accommodation, floods the island to the detriment of the national product.

Perhaps it is not just the energy grid that was not designed for this load. It is the island itself – Malta – that has consciously taken a line of flight that will bring a disastrous comeuppance. And yet, we keep choosing this economic direction and refuse to take the medicine that can cure us of our addiction to this unhealthy development model.

Both major parties as well as successive administrations believe in the electoral calculus of visible generosity over invisible resilience. The material benefits of a €1,000 super-bonus, or a €5,000 ‘SUV subsidy’ for families, appear hollow when an overloaded substation cannot provide us with the energy for a comfortable house, forcing families to take their children to sleep in air-conditioned cars.

Instead of selling voters the seduction of wealth, the Maltese government should be directing money towards mass installations of household battery backup systems, rooftop solar panels, and grid modernisation, producing infrastructure that serves everyone.

And still, the entire Labour Party universe across official and unofficial lines of communication, keep propping up the government’s shortcomings with mealy-mouthed comparisons with similar outages in Germany, France and Italy.

Such voices wreak of the worst kind of logrolling complacence.

All across Europe, governments educate citizens to reduce consumption and treat energy as a finite resource requiring collective discipline. Robert Abela’s administration instead refuses to penalise over-consumption or wasteful habits, to molly-coddle voters into hoping the consequences can always be managed later.

July’s power cuts are what ‘later’ looks like. And the climate crisis bill is not something that happens only at peak tourist season; a costlier bill awaits Malta – we are only deferring the cost through every electoral cycle that choses cash handouts over climate resilience.