Steps to prevent power cuts

Parts of the province were left without power for several hours

A blackout which left tens of thousands of people without power in Northern Ireland was a one-off which has now been rectified, according to the government.

Problems at two power stations on 4 December resulted in many homes and businesses being left without power for several hours.

Northern Ireland's main power station at Kilroot, near Belfast, shut down because of a technical fault.

At the same time, scheduled maintainance at Ballylumford power station near Larne, meant the plant was producing much less electricity than normal.

As a result, Northern Ireland Electricity was left without 25% of the power it normally needed to supply demand.

I wouldn't want people to think this is suddenly going to happen again because there are preventative measures in place Ian Pearson Enterprise Minister

Commenting on a report into the incident published on Monday, Enterprise Minister Ian Pearson said that the power cut was not the result of a shortfall in reserves, but a sudden fault at Kilroot.

He said steps had been taken to ensure there was full back-up if it happened again.

"There are lessons to be learnt, we need to make sure that this doesn't happen again," he said.

"But there isn't a problem in terms of capacity, it is not as if it is we have an ailing system here in Northern Ireland, we have got a system that is being modernised as we speak.

"This is very much an isolated incident that is the main message to come out of it and I wouldn't want people to think this is suddenly going to happen again because there are preventative measures in place."

At the height of the crisis, NIE introduced a series of rotated power cuts to ensure that customers were not without electricity for too long.

The worst affected areas were parts of Counties Down and Antrim, including parts of Belfast, where some traffic and street lights were also affected.

NIE said that the interconnector from Scotland had been operating normally and it had brought additional electricity to the province to counter the problems.