Eletrobrás selects 10 new Proinfa projects

Brazil's federal power holding company Eletrobrás has included 10 new projects in its Proinfa alternative energy source incentive program after the cancellation of other projects because of bureaucratic or legal problems, the company announced Monday. The developers of the newly selected projects have until August 11 to sign contracts. Eletrobrás and/or subsidiaries will sign 20-year power purchase contracts with the selected projects by way of an incentive to wind, biomass and small-scale hydroelectric plants. The new selection comes after some developers failed to sign the 20-year power purchase contract with Eletrobrás, while others were disqualified because they did not hand in required documents. More than 100 projects throughout the country have been selected. The projects have to start commercial operations by end-2006. Eletrobrás continues to appraise all contracts signed at end-June and is studying requests from companies for reclassification. Eletrobrás maintains its right to further change the projects selected, a company spokesperson told BNamericas. Enerbrasil, the wind power arm of Spain's Iberdrola, was one of the companies that did not sign the Proinfa contracts for three projects in the northeastern state of Rio Grande do Norte, and other companies that fell at the final hurdle included Brazil's Novaenergia, which had three wind projects in Rio de Janeiro state but was disqualified because of incomplete documentation, Eletrobrás announced. The latest 10 projects to be included in Proinfa are: Wind power: Siif Energies' Foz do Rio Choró (25.2MW) and Eolica Formosa's Formosa (12.4MW) projects in Ceará state, New Energy Options' Alegria II (64.7MW) in Rio Grande do Norte, Santa Cruz Energia's Cascata (4.8MW) and Santo Antonio (1.9MW) in Santa Catarina, Siif's Quintanilha Machado I (135MW) in Rio de Janeiro, and Gammesa's Serra dos Antunes (21.4MW) in Rio Grande do Sul. Small-scale hydro: Performance Centrais Hidrelétricas' Nova Aurora (18.3MW) in Goiás, and Buriti Energia's Salto Buriti (10MW) in Pará state. Biomass: Cocal's 30MW Canaã project in São Paulo state.