The substation has burned for days and the power stayed on: Meeden's problem is smoke, not supply

A fire broke out at TenneT's high-voltage station in Meeden, in the northeast of Groningen province, at around seven on the evening of Saturday 29 August. It started at a cross-regulating transformer and nobody was on site at the time. TenneT put the conclusion in the headline of its own statement: there is no impact on the electricity supply. The station was switched off as a precaution and the power rerouted, so no outage followed. A burning substation reads as a supply story, yet supply and this fire were separated on day one. What reaches homes is smoke: an NL-Alert went out locally because of the smoke, the safety region escalated to GRIP 1, and Veiligheidsregio Groningen is coordinating the fire service, police and the other agencies involved. source 1

The fire service is not extinguishing the transformer. It is letting it burn out under control while shielding it so the fire cannot jump to the adjacent building. TenneT explains that extinguishing is complex because what is alight is cooling oil; NOS adds that the oil is burning in six cellars beneath the station holding roughly 140,000 litres each, that water would spread the fire and that the blaze is too large to blanket with foam. A separate water supply was set up for the long deployment, and measurements of the surrounding area are running throughout. source 2

The official advice to residents carries a condition that most retellings drop. It reads: stay out of the smoke, close doors and windows, and switch off mechanical ventilation — in the official wording, only if you are bothered by smoke or the smell of smoke. It is not unconditional; your own nose is the trigger. That matters most in flats, because plenty of Dutch apartments and newer houses run continuous mechanical ventilation, and with the windows shut but the system still drawing, the smoke arrives anyway. Whether this touches you runs on two independent lines: smoke, judged on your distance from Meeden, the wind that day and whether you can actually smell it; and supply, which you read on the grid company's own pages rather than in fire coverage, because here the station being off and your home being off turned out to be two different facts. source 3

• Started around 19:00 on Saturday 29 August at TenneT's Meeden station, at a cross-regulating transformer, with nobody on site.
• Cooling oil in six cellars beneath the station is burning, roughly 140,000 litres each.
• It is not being extinguished: water would spread it and the fire is too large for foam.
• TenneT puts the finding in its own headline: no impact on the electricity supply; the station was switched off as a precaution and the load rerouted.
• Official advice: stay out of the smoke and shut doors and windows; switch off mechanical ventilation if you are bothered by smoke or its smell.
• An NL-Alert was issued, the safety region escalated to GRIP 1 and Veiligheidsregio Groningen coordinates; cause unknown, no casualties.

Hokimi field note: in a flat with continuous mechanical ventilation, closing the windows alone does nothing until the system is off too.