Sri Lanka blackout leaves country without grid power

Sri Lanka suffered a nationwide electricity blackout on Saturday after the national grid tripped, officials said.

State-run Electricity Distribution Lanka said engineers were working to repair a fault affecting the entire grid. The country was without grid power for more than two hours, and officials gave no clear timeline for full restoration.

Energy Minister Anura Karunathilaka said authorities hoped to restore supplies stage by stage and asked rooftop solar system owners to disconnect their systems until further instructions. EDL said it suspected excess solar power had caused the breakdown.

A previous nationwide grid shutdown in February 2025, when solar power generation exceeded consumption, took more than six hours to restore. Sri Lanka has just over 3,000 megawatts of installed solar capacity, while daytime demand ranges from 2,000 to 2,500 megawatts.