Spain is preparing new avalanche renewable. That’s what it should be, that’s the purpose. But supporters of new renewables, both wind and solar, warn of the enormous challenges they face and how they have had to face them in launching their projects in the Spanish market. administrative procedures from three to six years from the beginning of the process until it is finally operational.
“There is a serious problem for the development of renewable projects in Spain. It is not normal for solid projects to take years to process,” he said. Loreto Ordóñez, CEO of Engie Spain, in his speech at the VII Energy Forum organized by ‘El Economista’. “Continuing to invest in renewable energy in Spain is a matter of concern,” warns the senior executive of the French giant’s Spanish subsidiary.
The roadmap set by the government to promote the decarbonisation of the energy sector envisions installing approximately 60,000 megawatts (MW) of renewable energy by 2030. One goal that the executive plans to revise, in line with Union demands, to make this even more ambitious is the union, which is already overwhelmed by the backlog of demand to build new green power plants.
according to the latest data Spanish Electricity Grid, The manager of the high voltage grid and the operator of the power system granted grid access to projects of 144,600 MW at the end of August, and an additional 32,100 MW is currently operating in addition to 42,300 MW. wind and photovoltaic are already working. And to all this barrage of demand, we must add 135,000 MW, which Red Eléctrica has not already allowed.
Despite successive measures taken by the government to curb speculation and burst a feared bubble in the industry, demands for new renewable utilities to be connected to the electricity grid are nearly tripling all new green energy the Government has planned for the next decade in its Integrated National Energy and Climate Plan. (PNIEC).
Hundreds of projects at risk
Utilities and the renewable energy sector acknowledge that a significant portion of this flood of applications is not a real project, and that project owners will withdraw or reject the request. The biggest problem is that in the midst of the energy transition there are hundreds of projects with huge luxury that the Spanish economy cannot afford, with energy projects behind them and at risk of not being able to continue due to accumulated delay. Administrations.
“It doesn’t make sense to lose a single megawatt of renewable energy in Spain. We can’t take years and months to process to be able to connect to the network,” he continues. Rafael Mateo, CEO of Acciona Energy. “You have to turn a blind eye to some paperwork. It is useful to review the bureaucracy when there is an emergency, as well as an avalanche of demand,” he said.
Last December, the government approved a nine-month extension of deadlines for renewable promoters to obtain some interim permits (environmental impact statement and preliminary administrative permit), preventing hundreds of projects from dropping due to administration delays, where backers could lose any guarantees offered to obtain networked licenses and access permits. With the new deadlines, most projects should receive these permits by the end of this year or very early 2023.
The avalanche of renewable projects continues to collapse the Administrations. responsible for issuing permits and causing major delays in processing (Ministry of Ecological Transition for large projects over 50 MW and autonomous communities for smaller power plants). Delays threaten to push projects with a real construction plan. “Every kilowatt counts, of course it matters. Let’s not lose a single one”, stresses Juan José Sánchez, CEO of Capital Energy. “With 3,000 MW of wind power, which should already be operational, we could displace all the Russian gas used to generate electricity.”
Industrial groups that are heavy electricity consumers also show their concerns about stopping the use of renewable energy sources. this Spanish Association of Major Energy Consumption Companies (AEGE)Bringing together about thirty major industrial groups with a presence in Spain, it has proposed to the Government the possibility of giving priority to processing permits to renewable utilities that have pledged that a large part of their production will be used for fixed contracts. -long-term price (PPA according to industry terminology).
Actual connection to the network
Complaints from renewable sources focus on lengthy administrative processes with central government and autonomous communities. But they also warn that an efficient connection to the Red Eléctrica high voltage grid is expected.
“You can’t have a 500-megawatt power plant that can’t power the grid because it’s over a month old and an authorization is missing,” he complains. Mario Ruiz Table, new CEO of Iberdrola Spain. “It’s a luxury we can’t afford if it’s going to take you six months to have a finished plant and connect it to the grid,” he says a lot. José Miguel Ferrar, Managing Director of Statkraft Spain, The renewable giant of the Norwegian State.
Red Eléctrica highlights the speed with which the company is enabling the physical and technical integration of new renewable plants into the high-voltage grid (4,300 MW connected last year), but acknowledges that sometimes there is a final permit for final disruption. Roberto García Merino, CEO of Redeia (Red Eléctrica’s parent company)insists that the real bottleneck is administration lag and that the group is processing requests to grant access at a good pace.
less bureaucracy
The government does not hide its concern about the delay in the distribution of renewable resources due to administrative delays and is examining legislative changes to reduce bureaucracy and pave the way for the commissioning of power plants. “We need to look at what kind of regulatory measures to adopt, how to simplify processes to help supporters of renewable projects and accelerate larger projects. “We need to see how we can reduce administrative processing times without compromising environmental and heritage controls.” Joan Groizard, executive director of the Institute for Energy Diversification and Conservation (IDAE), which means that the aim is to implement these reforms as soon as possible.
In parallel, the central government has expressed its frustration at the lack of personnel in recent months to open the renewable energy demand threshold by different Administrations, especially regional ones. Autonomous communities acknowledged that they were unable to handle the avalanche of requests received, and it was the regional governments that unanimously requested the Government to extend the terms of the interim permits, and the Ministry of Ecological Transition requested sufficient resources from the regions to meet the demand. .