Brazilian wind power producers losing big money since August outage

Abeeólica, an association representing Brazil’s wind power industry, claimed in a letter to regulators that plants in the country’s Northeast region have been hemorrhaging money since the adoption of stricter operating standards following a massive power outage on August 15.

An outage in the national power grid interrupted electricity supply in 26 of Brazil’s 27 states, affecting more than 29 million Brazilians. Brazil’s power grid is almost completely integrated, so a local event can have ripple effects throughout the country. 

The ONS, which operates Brazil’s national power grid, concluded that failures in the operation of voltage control equipment at wind and solar plants in the Northeast region caused the disruption. Since then, the ONS began operating the system in a more conservative manner, adopting more restrictive criteria for the use of energy from the Northeast in other regions. 

This “led to a limitation of approximately 7 GW of energy exports in the Northeast region,” Abeeólica said in its letter. The association cites generation cuts of up to 95 percent, as was the case of the Santo Agostinho complex operated by French multinational utility company Engie. Estimates of lost revenue hover around BRL 75 million (USD 14.8 million) so far, according to the association’s own calculations.

The estimates are based on public ONS data, but Abeeólica says the real numbers are higher.

“Even if the ONS understands that to maintain the security of the system it has to gradually increase its limits, Abeeólica understands that these costs should not be imposed entirely on [producers],” it continues. “Renewable energy generators are  bearing the full effects of these operational measures in an unfair and excessive way, without any compensation.”

Experts say the restrictions are also costing consumers, as the government has moved to increase its reliance on thermal plants — which are more expensive and polluting.

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