pgfplots not working with TexLive on Windows - latex

Question

\begin{tikzpicture}
\begin{axis}
\addplot[color=red]{exp(x)};
\end{axis}
\end{tikzpicture}
%Here ends the 2D plot
\hskip 5pt
%Here begins the 3D plot
\begin{tikzpicture}
\begin{axis}
\addplot3[
surf,
]
{exp(-x^2-y^2)*x};
\end{axis}
\end{tikzpicture}
Gives the following error:
Package tikz: Sorry, the system call 'pdflatex -halt-on-error -interaction=batchmode -jobname "main-figure0" "\def\tikzexternalrealjob{main}\input{main}"' did NOT result in a usable output file 'main-figure0' (expected one of .pdf:.jpg:.jpeg:.png:). Please verify that you have enabled system calls. For pdflatex, this is 'pdflatex -shell-escape'. Sometimes it is also named 'write 18' or something like that. Or maybe the command simply failed? Error messages can be found in 'main-figure0.log'. If you continue now, I'll try to typeset the picture.
And when looking in the log:
This is pdfTeX, Version 3.141592653-2.6-1.40.24 (TeX Live 2022) (preloaded format=pdflatex 2022.4.7) 8 FEB 2023 12:32
entering extended mode
restricted \write18 enabled.
file:line:error style messages enabled.
%&-line parsing enabled.
**PATH/main.tex
(PATH/main.tex
LaTeX2e <2021-11-15> patch level 1
L3 programming layer <2022-02-24> (c:/texlive/2022/texmf-dist/tex/latex/base/report.cls
Document Class: report 2021/10/04 v1.4n Standard LaTeX document class
(c:/texlive/2022/texmf-dist/tex/latex/base/size11.clo
File: size11.clo 2021/10/04 v1.4n Standard LaTeX file (size option)
)
(when compiling with --escape-shell):
This is pdfTeX, Version 3.141592653-2.6-1.40.24 (TeX Live 2022) (preloaded format=pdflatex 2022.4.7) 8 FEB 2023 13:22
entering extended mode
\write18 enabled.
%&-line parsing enabled.
**main.tex
(./main.tex
LaTeX2e <2021-11-15> patch level 1
L3 programming layer <2022-02-24>
(c:/texlive/2022/texmf-dist/tex/latex/base/report.cls
Document Class: report 2021/10/04 v1.4n Standard LaTeX document class
(c:/texlive/2022/texmf-dist/tex/latex/base/size11.clo
File: size11.clo 2021/10/04 v1.4n Standard LaTeX file (size option)
)
and later:
===== 'mode=convert with system call': Invoking 'pdflatex -halt-on-error -interaction=batchmode -jobname "main-figure0" "\def\tikzexternalrealjob{main}\input{main}"' ========
runsystem(pdflatex -halt-on-error -interaction=batchmode -jobname "main-figure0" "\def\tikzexternalrealjob{main}\input{main}")...disabled (restricted).
\openout3 = `main.auxlock'.
./0_abstract.tex:14: Package tikz Error: Sorry, the system call 'pdflatex -halt-on-error -interaction=batchmode -jobname "main-figure0" "\def\tikzexternalrealjob{main}\input{main}"' did NOT result in a usable output file 'main-figure0' (expected one of .pdf:.jpg:.jpeg:.png:). Please verify that you have enabled system calls. For pdflatex, this is 'pdflatex -shell-escape'. Sometimes it is also named 'write 18' or something like that. Or maybe the command simply failed? Error messages can be found in 'main-figure0.log'. If you continue now, I'll try to typeset the picture.
See the tikz package documentation for explanation.
Type H <return> for immediate help.
...
l.14 \end{tikzpicture}
I have included the right packages etc.:
\usepackage{tikz}
\usepackage{pgfplots}
\pgfplotsset{width=10cm,compat=1.9}
% We will externalize the figures
\usepgfplotslibrary{external}
\tikzexternalize
I have also tried running it with things such as:
--shell-escape main.tex
--enable-write18 main.tex
or adding
\tikzexternalize[shell escape=-shell-escape]
But this does not seem to work, everything does work correctly when I e.g. open it in Overleaf.
minimal reproducible example:
\documentclass[11pt,a4paper,oneside]{report}
\usepackage{tikz}
\usepackage{pgfplots}
\pgfplotsset{width=10cm,compat=1.9}
% We will externalize the figures
\usepgfplotslibrary{external}
\tikzexternalize
% Do not automatically indent text
\setlength\parindent{0pt}
\begin{document}
\begin{tikzpicture}
\begin{axis}
\addplot[color=red]{exp(x)};
\end{axis}
\end{tikzpicture}
%Here ends the 2D plot
\hskip 5pt
%Here begins the 3D plot
\begin{tikzpicture}
\begin{axis}
\addplot3[
surf,
]
{exp(-x^2-y^2)*x};
\end{axis}
\end{tikzpicture}
\end{document}