Australia's electronic spy agency was forced to rely on diesel backup generators when the nation's power supply came under intense pressure during last month's heatwave.
The Turnbull government claims the nation's cyber security was put in jeopardy when the Department of Defence - which houses the shadowy Australian Signals Directorate - was asked to help with load shedding during soaring temperatures on February 10.
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Cyber spies in power scare
Heat wave conditions in February forced Australia's cyber security defences to move to diesel generators
Dan Tehan, the minister responsible for cyber security, said ASD shifted to generators as a precautionary measure because it was concerned about the reliability of the grid.
"This meant that an agency responsible for critical infrastructure was on backup power to preempt a cut," Mr Tehan said.
"Having the Department of Defence be put onto generators is a rare and significant event."
The ASD seeks to protect Australia from cyber attack and electronic espionage - while also conducting spying of its own. The nature of its work means the agency is a large user of power.
The government has sought to use the episode to increase pressure on Labor over its commitment to increasing renewable energy use, arguing it would make the grid even less reliable.
"This government will not sit by and allow the leader of the opposition to have the security agencies that keep us safe sitting in the dark," Mr Tehan told Question Time on Wednesday.
The ACT Labor government aims to have Canberra fully powered by renewable energy by 2020.
However the ACT is still largely reliant on fossil fuels, with about 25 per cent generated from renewables.
Canberra Airport was also asked to move on to generators by power provider ActewAGL during the "supply emergency".
ActewAGL at one stage feared it would be required to conduct rolling blackouts across Canberra to meet the demands of the Australian Energy Market Operator to help stabilise the network.
However it suffered only minor outages after households, businesses and government agencies helped reduce demand.
ASD is thought to be extremely energy intensive given its reliance on high-tech computing and networking.