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Chile producing too much solar energy

Chile Has So Much Solar Energy It’s Giving It Away for Free , Bloomberg, 2 June 16 

• Spot prices reached zero for 113 days this year through April
• Solar power on Chile’s central grid quadrupled since 2013

• Chile’s solar industry has expanded so quickly that it’s giving electricity away for free.

  Spot prices reached zero in parts of the country on 113 days through April, a number that’s on track to beat last year’s total of 192 days, according to Chile’s central grid operator. While that may be good for consumers, it’s bad news for companies that own power plants struggling to generate revenue and developers seeking financing for new facilities.

  Chile’s increasing energy demand, pushed by booming mining production and economic growth, has helped spur development of 29 solar farms supplying the central grid, with another 15 planned. Further north, in the heart of the mining district, even more have been built. Now, economic growth is slowing as copper output stagnates amid a global glut, energy prices are slumping and those power plants are oversupplying regions that lack transmission lines to distribute the electricity elsewhere………

• Inadequate Infrastructure

  The government is working to address this issue, with plans to build a 3,000-kilometer(1,865-mile) transmission line to link the the two grids by 2017. It’s also developing a 753-kilometer line to address congestion on the northern parts of the central grid, the region where power surpluses are driving prices to zero…….

• When power companies aren’t giving away electricity, it’s cheap. At the Diego de Almagro substation in the Atacama region, for example, prices didn’t exceed $60 a megawatt-hour for most of March. That’s less than the $70 minimum price for companies that won long-term contracts to sell solar power in Chile’s energy auctions in October and March……..http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-06-01/chile-has-so-much-solar-energy-it-s-giving-it-away-for-free

June 3, 2016 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | renewable, SOUTH AMERICA