Until 2022, Naturgy’s presence in Canary Islands It has focused on wind farms, with a total of ten wind farms in operation, which have a total installed capacity of 75 MW and produce around 200 GWh of energy per year. 2023 will be the great year of the photovoltaic development of the energy company in the archipelago, since during this year a total of 12 installations with this technology are expected to come into operation.
All these new projects add up to a total of 52 MW of power, which will generate 99 GWh/year of electricity, which is equivalent to the annual consumption of more than 28,400 homes, and will prevent the emission into the atmosphere of 123,500 tons of CO2 per year.
The first to come into operation will be Salinetas, in the municipality of Telde, with 4.1 MW of power. After it will come Puerto del Rosario, Naturgy’s most powerful photovoltaic plant in the Canary Islands, with 11.5 MW, and the only one of the company in Fuerteventura; the Escobar I and II photovoltaic parks, in Ingenio, with 3.4 MW of power respectively; Gran Canaria I and Gran Canaria II, with 6 MW of power each and located in Agüimes; and Telde I (3.6 MW), Telde IV (2.1 MW) and Telde V (1.8 MW), which will be operational in the coming months. To these 9 projects we must add another three photovoltaic plants, Telde II, Telde III and Gran Canaria III, which are pending the obtaining of a works permit and the overcoming of some administrative procedures, and which add up to 10 MW of power. In addition, the company is working on the development of other photovoltaic and wind projects, as a sign of the company’s commitment to the energy transition on the islands.
“We are already a benchmark in wind power in the Canary Islands -explains Sergio Auffray, head of Naturgy’s Renewable Development on the islands-, and this year we will also become a benchmark in photovoltaics. Ultimately, what we are after is to be leaders in the Canary Islands energy market and show our commitment to decarbonisation in the archipelago”.
This deployment of renewable infrastructures has been possible thanks to the fact that Naturgy was the highest bidder in the auction of the first bidding process for photovoltaic capacity endowed with FEDER funds (SolCan), with 44 MW of power, and the second largest bidder of the auctioned power in the Canary Islands, with 20 MW of power, in the second bidding process for wind capacity endowed with FEDER funds (EolCan2).
