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Chile renewables policy ‘is failing to deliver the goods for country’

Ecopower Chile S.A.C. en los medios, publicado reNews Americas, 9 octubre 2008.

Chile urgently requires a national renewable energy policy, according to local wind developer Ecopower. General manager Julio Albarrán has called for political leaders to take action as legislation drawn up in 2005 to encourage alternative projects has “failed to deliver”.

Under existing laws, ‘non-conventional’ power generators such as wind and solar farms smaller than 20MW are offered beneficial transmission charges, and those below 9MW pay nothing. But Albarrán said that with a tally of just two wind farms totalling 20MW, a tax credit-style mechanism is “urgently needed to give producers investment incentives in Chile”.

In 2010, a 5% renewables obligation system comes into play and the concern is that production will fail to meet projected demand. Ecopower, in partnership
with Spanish-owned Enhol-Chile, is pushing ahead with what will be the country’s third and largest wind farm to date, a 140MW scheme on the island of Chiloé.

Following a positive wind resource analysis of the area, Ecopower hopes to submit its environmental impact assessment this week with a view to breaking ground in a year’s time. Enhol will use a mix of 2MW Vestas and 3MW Gamesa turbines because of the variation in wind resource across the project’s two distinct zones.

Ecopower has three further schemes between 80MW and 100MW in the pipeline along Chile’s coast, and is “in the process of signing merchant contracts with 3000 companies for micro installations between 10 and 200kW”, according to Albarrán.

Enhol-Chile is planning a $1 billion housing and power generation project at Talinay in Chile’s Region IV. If approved by Chilean authorities it would be Latin America’s largest wind farm at 500MW.

Fuente/Source:
reNews Americas 10, 9 october 2008.

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