Clipping of news on Brazilian Culture, Law and Citizenship
07/04/2012
This article was translated by an automatic translation system, and was therefore not reviewed by people.
SAO PAULO - A study released today (3) by the Energy Research Company (EPE), the Ministry of Mines and Energy, shows that the production of residential solar energy (the so-called distributed generation) is economically viable for 15% of Brazilian homes. The production of solar energy on a large scale (centralized generation), however, is still unviable, even with government incentives.
According to the research of EPE, the cost of generation in Brazilian homes, from a small power equipment, is R$ 602 per megawatt hour (MWh), cheaper than energy sold for more than ten of the 60 energy distribution, such as the Wide, responsible for supplying the cities Grande Rio and inner Fluminense.
The calculation is based on the average cost of installing a panel with the lowest power, r$ 38 000. Thanks to new resolutions of the National Electric Energy Agency (Aneel), published this year, consumers who install solar panels on their homes or condos can not only reduce the amount of energy purchased by distributors, as well as sell the excess energy produced to these companies.
As president of the EPE, Mauricio Tolmasquim, this potential market can grow quite large when they are given incentives such as financing the purchase of photovoltaic panels and inverters (devices that transform sunlight into electricity), the tax exemption for the production of such equipment in the country and the reduction of income tax to consumers.
If the government is willing to create the three types of incentives at the same time, solar energy could become competitive for 98% of residential consumers in Brazil. "Today's distributed generation is already more or less interesting in some places. Now, to enlarge, or incentives would need to wait for the price [of equipment] down, "said Tolmasquim.
Moreover, the study showed that the centralized generation, that is produced in large scale commercial power plants, it is not economically feasible. Today, the production cost of solar energy is around r$ 405 per MWh, while the average price of other energy sources in recent government auctions, was r$ 150 per MWh.
Even with incentives such as tax cuts, which barateiem by 28% the price of energy, solar is not feasible, because it still would cost double the rate charged in auctions of energy.
According Tolmasquim, the country has the option of waiting for the cost of solar down to put it in auctions or create an auction so there are no specific dispute with other cheaper sources such as wind.
Tolmasquim explained that the creation of a particular auction is an option to create and develop a market technologically the country in order to accelerate the reduction of cost. "But that would be sold a small amount [of energy] not to burden the consumer."
There is also the option of opening the possibility for enterprises to generate solar energy auction to compete with other sources. The expectation of the International Energy Agency is that solar is competitive with other sources in the world from 2020.
Tolmasquim said, however, it is not possible to know when the solar energy will be competitive for large scale production in Brazil. There are now only eight projects in the country, producing only 1.5 megawatt (MW) of a total of 118 000 MW in Brazil.
Source: The Day Online
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This article was translated by an automatic translation system, and was therefore not reviewed by people.