Why regulations and batteries matter for ISA InterColombia

ISA InterColombia is advancing power transmission projects in Colombia despite socio-environmental challenges and licensing bottlenecks. 

In this interview with BNamericas, CEO Carlos Mario Caro underlines the importance of energy storage solutions and new technologies while calling for regulatory updates to enable a faster clean energy transition.

BNamericas: Two of the main projects that ISA InterColombia has in Colombia are the Cuestecitas-Copey-Fundación and Sogamoso-La Loma transmission lines. We understand that the first section of Cuestecitas-Copey-Fundación has already started operating but the main part from Cuestecitas continues to face social and environmental challenges. The Sogamoso-La Loma line has had similar challenges. Can you tell us how these projects are progressing and when they are expected to begin operations?

Caro: For the Copey-Cuestecitas section, we’re talking about nine or 10 towers that have some problems with the property. Specifically, we haven’t been able to contact some owners. And we’re currently entering with the military to be able to finish those towers. We hope to have that transmission line energized in about three months because the substations are already at a very advanced stage. In other words, the substations will be energized by February at the latest. About the line, there are two properties that are difficult to access. But if we manage to continue with the support of the army and continue our work, we hope to start commercial operations by March 2025 at the latest.

BNamericas: And the Sogamoso-La Loma project?

Caro: It’s a 297km, 500kW project. It has two substations: one in Sogamoso and one in La Loma, which are already built. We’re only missing the transmission line. We’ve submitted an environmental impact study. They returned it and we’ve made some requests because, as the environmental impact study stands now, it cannot be built. We hope that [environmental licensing agency] ANLA responds soon. What do we need to update with these studies? Because they have to be updated in parts, we’ve asked to update it as we start construction. And then we hope, if everything goes well, to start quickly. In a year and a half we hope to have that other project in commercial operation.

BNamericas: How can Colombia overcome the challenge of building energy projects – not just transmission but generation plants – without the socio-environmental risk? It seems to me that it goes beyond education and social investment commitments by companies and has more to do with a need to change the regulatory framework. Do you also see it that way?

Caro: It depends on what you’re talking about in terms of the regulatory framework. If we talk about the social and environmental aspects, we need to review, for example, the studies that exist today. Because the studies are done for generation, transmission, distribution, mining, these studies should be divided. The energy transmission business is not the same as the generation business or mining. 

In other words, the generation business is very specific in one area of the country. Mining is the same. However, transmission runs through many corridors, and that is why it should be a less complex study. It goes through more areas, but it has less interference. For transmission, we don’t use river water. We don’t use effluents. In reality, it’s building a right-of-way, which is an easement that is more or less 60m long. What we have to do is open some holes to place the towers.

Studies must be done but the environmental impact studies must be more flexible. So, we have to coordinate closely with ANLA to work together and make sure that these studies don’t take so long. In the past, the technical part took much longer than working on the environmental impact study. Today, it has become a bottleneck. 

The good news is that we have a very good relationship with ANLA. They believe in our work. And our prior consultations are always done in agreement with the communities. In any case, today, in Colombia and many parts of the world, it’s difficult to build transmission lines. But it’s a challenge that we have to overcome. And if the regulations change and become more flexible, we can do it in the shortest time possible. Because for the energy transition to become a reality, we need all these transmission lines to come online quickly and support solar and wind generation. And we can change the world through decarbonization.

BNamericas: You have said that Colombia needs to adopt more modern licensing processes, like in the United States. Could you explain which elements of the US procedures could be implemented in Colombia to speed up transmission projects?

Caro: To have a simpler environmental impact study and have the government help with construction. First it should be done in parts, especially for projects that are 300, 400km long. Studies have to be done – biotic studies of the system in the rainy season, dry season. It takes time to do those analyses. Then, while they’re delivered and analyzed, adjustments are needed sometimes due to the secondary law on deforestation. If one takes too long to do the study and it takes longer to get it approved, then the studies become outdated. 

The important thing is for the studies to be broken up. If it's 300km, then let's do a study on 50km, analyze and approve it, and then deliver another 50km and we start building. That dynamic of the company having good relations with the State through ANLA can bring about good results in less time. 

BNamericas: Aside from the difficulties of the licensing processes, including the obligation to hold prior individual consultations with so many communities, there is a clear need to change the regulatory framework for the operation of these lines, including incentives for ancillary or complementary services, including energy storage. Is there progress on this issue and do you think there will soon be some regulatory change that will make investment in these services and the adoption of new technologies more attractive?

Caro: When we talk about the energy transition, it covers everything you tell me. The energy transition is not about installing a solar panel. It’s a set of measures that must be taken to decarbonize the planet. So, when one talks about this, you say, let’s install more renewable energy. If one installs more renewable energy, which depends on the sun, the wind, biomass, for example, they are unstable, there is no firm, clear power. If it’s cloudy, then solar energy is stopped, if there’s no wind, then wind power stops. So, the control centers have to work in a different way.

Here everything has to be done much faster. And then other technologies appear. What other technologies? Storage appears, as a possibility of collecting that solar energy, storing it at night. Another thing is that many times, for example, we’re in a time of abundant rain and there’s a lot of water, and instead of throwing the water away, so to speak, because it’s not needed at that moment, it can also be stored. If one uses storage, it can be used when it’s most needed. That is why storage is important.

There are other technologies such as FACTS or smart valves that allow you to recirculate load flows from one side to the other, not in one direction from generation to load, but in any direction, which makes the operation faster. So, with all these technologies that are coming out, we need the regulator, in this case the CREG, to approve these technologies at the speed at which they’re coming out. But it’s not just the CREG. All over the world, regulators take a while to absorb these technologies and put in place the necessary regulatory framework. We need the technology to go at the same speed as the regulatory frameworks and allow us to implement everything that is appearing in order to appropriate that technology and for everything to benefit from the energy transition.

So, that’s why it’s so important that this comes out quickly. For example, synchronous compensators are so important that they are already being used in several countries. For example, in Colombia, for next year we have a tender for five synchronous compensators, in which we are going to participate. And we’ve also already spoken with the [government energy planning company] UPME, with the CREG, about the regulation of storage that will also come out next year. They’ve made a commitment at UPME, they tell me that next year they won’t finish the year without having launched one or two storage tenders, which is very important for the development of the country.

BNamericas: Speaking specifically about storage projects, it’s good that there could be an auction next year. Does ISA already have some projects in mind or are you already working on a large-scale storage project?

Caro: We’re waiting for what may come out. But, for example, there is a [transmission] line that goes from Bucaramanga, from Los Palos to Caño Limón, which is in the department of Arauca. And that area and that line is an isolated line. In other words, there’s only one line, there’s no other backup corridor. And that line is the one that is currently out of service the most due to atmospheric discharges or other factors. And there’s no way to reestablish the circuit elsewhere. We’re proposing, for example, to place a battery to raise the energy needed in the area for when the line goes out of service. We’re making a proposal there.

But we’re also looking at other proposals that may exist in the north of the country, in the coastal area, since so much solar energy is coming in, on how to place these storage facilities or these batteries in some of those sites. We’re doing studies, but it’s clear that in the first quarter of 2025, InterColombia will be having several people working together to launch some storage projects because it’s one of the keys for us in this leadership role that we have within the energy transition.

BNamericas: And the company already has experience in Brazil with a storage project, right?

Caro: In Brazil, at the Registro substation, we have a 50MW battery that only works in the summer and it’s very important because it’s connected for two hours and that is enough to alleviate the loads that exist on the coast of the São Paulo region. Everyone heads to the coast in the summer and with so much demand there’s no way to supply what is needed and this battery has helped a lot to solve that problem. That is the answer to people who say: “How can a battery of that size be justified for just two hours a day?” It has helped a lot to improve the system in that area of São Paulo.