2023-11-05 11:01:45
Electrical companies are looking for new formulas to exploit their plants more and better renewable. Spain has embarked on a massive deployment of new green facilities that will continue in the coming decades. And in the midst of an avalanche of projects in development, the companies’ plans anticipate a new boom in the renewable energy sector in Spain to make more use of the land on which their plants are located and make the most of the coveted connection points to the electrical grid. .
Large groups like Iberdrola, Endesa, Naturgy, Acciona or Solaria Dozens of large hybrid renewable plant projects are being prepared. The hybridization It is a process that involves combining several types of green energy in the same installation to make more use of rural land and also the existing infrastructure for access to the electrical grid.
The hybridization that is going to become the most common will involve placing solar panels between the wind turbines of wind farms, but companies are also preparing projects to combine green electricity generation equipment with storage (although this is a still incipient modality awaiting further development of the use of high-capacity batteries).
Energy companies have already started to request the necessary permits to develop these new ‘megaplants’ that will mix windmills, solar panels and/or batteries. Red Electric of Spain (REE)the manager of the electrical system, has had to reformulate its statistics on the status of grid connection permits in order to reflect the new boom that is coming.
Dozens of projects emerge
The data accumulated so far on requests for plant hybridization anticipate that this modality will have a relevant role in the national green sector. REE accumulates hybridization requests with a combined power of 11,000 megawatts (MW)which confirms the interest of the renewable sector in joining this practice to make the most of its facilities and anticipates billion-dollar investments to achieve it.
According to official REE records at the end of October, renewable plants already in operation (mostly wind) and with a total power of 7,300 MW have requested authorization to combine with another green installation. And they also reflect that another 3,400 MW installations already have permission to access the grid, but are not yet in operation, and another 300 MW are only in the pipeline and have already processed the request to connect to the grid but are still in the pipeline. waiting to receive permission.
Red Eléctrica has decided to disaggregate from this monthly statistics the data of all the plants that have requested hybridization. When an installation hybridizes, the technology is no longer purely wind or solar and that is why for weeks dozens of renewable plants in operation had disappeared from the statistics, as they did not fit into the statistical sections used until now, as El Periódico de España revealed. of the Ibérica Press Group. Now the records on grid access procedures include different sections for wind plants, for photovoltaics and for hybridization.
Aragon It is the autonomous community with the most renewable plants already underway and with plans to hybridize, with 2,100 MW, followed by Castilla la Mancha (2.000 MW), Andalusia and Castilla y León (with 1,100 MW each) and Estremadura (with 900 MW). Aragón is also the one that accumulates the most requests for projects that are not yet in operation, with new 1,800 MW hybrid, linked to the construction by Endesa of a green ‘megacomplex’ in the location where the old coal plant of Andorra, in Teruel.
Access points to the electrical grid have become a treasure coveted by energy companies. The saturation of the grid in some areas and the boom in new renewable plants has turned these connection points into a scarce and highly contested asset, even generating speculative movements of reselling projects just for having permission to connect to the grid.
Hybridizations of different technologies in a single plant serve to make better use of that connection to the network, since by sharing the connection point it is not necessary to build new power lines or substations. The hybrid plants are located on land that was already destined for renewable generation and thus allow for common roads and facilities for the operation of both technologies, and reducing the environmental impact that two independent plants would have had. Furthermore, this modality allows for greater stability in the supply from the same discharge point, with more constant electricity generation.
The companies’ plans
Giants in the sector such as Iberdrola, Endesa, Naturgy, Acciona Energía or Solaria They have joined the strategy of hybridizing plants and have million-dollar plans to build new plants of this modality or to renovate and adapt existing facilities. In most cases these are projects to combine wind and photovoltaic energy in the same installation, although some already contemplate combining renewables and batteries.
Naturgy has deployed a plan to analyze the hybridization potential of its generation park to join this new revolution by developing new projects or expanding existing facilities. A few months ago, the group closed the purchase from the Ardian fund of a renewable portfolio in Spain that included 435 MW of hybrid projects under development in Castilla y León, Andalusia, Galicia and Catalonia.
Apart from this acquisition, Naturgy is already preparing other projects, especially in Castilla-La Mancha, which will convert twelve wind farms into hybrid solar energy generation plants, with the aim of them being operational in 2025. In addition to these wind hybridization plans -solar, the company is also working on the development of three other hydraulic integration projects with photovoltaic energy and another five battery storage projects to hybridize photovoltaic plants that are already in operation.
Iberdrola The construction of the first hybrid wind and solar photovoltaic plant in Spain was completed last September in Burgos, and is now working towards its commissioning with a power of 74 MW and after an investment of 40 million euros. The bet of Endesa due to hybridization in Spain, it will have as its flagship the renewable ‘megacomplex’ that it will install on the land of its old coal plant in Andorra, in Teruel. The just transition project for the area includes the construction of seven hybrid plants that will have a combined power of 1,800 MW and an investment of more than 1,500 million. For its part, Activate Energy It has 2,300 MW photovoltaic hybridization projects in different stages of development.
A good part of the hybridization projects are wind farms in which electricity companies decide to include solar panels among the wind turbines. In the case of Solaria, the process is the other way around. Specialized in the development of photovoltaic plants, the company has decided to install mills in part of them. Solaria’s plans include developing a portfolio of 3,000 MW of installations that combine solar and wind, of which 1,200 MW are already in the pipeline and the remaining 1,800 MW will be activated over the next year.
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