Chile: Stepping up the focus on alternative energy

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http://www.speroforum.com/site/article.asp?idarticle=12339

Chile: Stepping up the focus on alternative energy

Chile is rich in natural resources with energy potential, like the wind, ocean and rivers, the sun and biomass, but the country only began to take them into account in 2004, while importing 72 percent of its energy.

Wednesday, November 21, 2007
By Daniela Estrada

Chile is rich in natural resources with energy potential, like the wind, ocean and rivers, the sun and biomass, but the country only began to take them into account in 2004, while importing 72 percent of the energy its population consumes.

In November 2006, the administration of Michelle Bachelet set the goal for 15 percent of new electricity generating capacity to come from renewable, non-conventional sources by 2010.

"The government's objective can be achieved. We are on the right track, but not with the intensity we'd like," Mario Manríquez, vice-president of the Chilean Association of Renewable Alternative Energies, told Tierramérica.

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The main thing at stake is a bill that calls for eight percent of the electricity sold by the leading producers to come from non-conventional, renewable sources. It would begin with five percent in 2010, growing 0.3 percent each year until reaching eight percent in 2024. Those who fail to comply would have to pay a fine.

In Manríquez's opinion, the portion of clean energy sources should increase one percent annually until reaching 10 percent, which he says is still too low.

The capacity of Chile's four electrical systems is about 12,000 megawatts, of which just 2.6 percent comes from renewable sources -- mostly biomass (agricultural waste) from the paper industry, and hydroelectric dams for less than 20 megawatts. Wind energy contributes just two megawatts nationally.

Since 2000, solar panels and small wind-run generators have been installed in isolated households, as part of the Rural Electrification Programme.

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Several studies indicate that Chile's wind energy potential is 10,000 megawatts. But the Alto Baguales wind park, which has operated since 2001 generating two megawatts, is the only one connected to the electrical grid, in the southern region of Aysén. At the end of this year the second one will begin operating, in the central region of Coquimbo.

It is known as Canela, a holding of Endesa Eco, affiliate of the Spanish transnational, with 11 turbines that will produce 18.15 megawatts for the Central Interconnected System, which supplies 93 percent of the population.

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