Argentina watch: Nuclear project plans, renewable plant startups

Construction of Argentina’s fourth nuclear power plant could start around the middle of 2022, an official said.

The government hopes to finalize an associated contract with China by the end of this year, José Luis Antúnez, chairman of state company Nucleoeléctrica Argentina, told government news agency Télam.  

The enriched uranium plant – Atucha III – would be built using Chinese financing and technology.

Antúnez said that the plan was for Argentina to build its own plant, using heavy water and natural uranium, two years later.

Some 1.8GW of installed capacity would be added to the grid, Antúnez was quoted as saying.

Nucleoeléctrica Argentina operates three plants: Atucha I, Atucha II and Embalse.

A 2018 report produced by the government and academia with IDB support, Escenarios Energéticos Argentina 2040, said the country needed to boost power generation capacity to a minimum of 85.5GW by 2040, which would require billions of dollars in investment.

Installed capacity stood at 42.45GW in June, according to data from wholesale power market administrator Cammesa. 

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Five renewables plants began injecting electricity into the grid in the second quarter, Argentina’s energy department said.

Three are wind and two biogas, contributing 188MW of installed capacity and requiring combined investment of US$276mn.

At end-June, Argentina had 177 renewables plants in operation for a total of 4.75GW.

Last month, renewables covered, on average, 11.5% of demand.

The five plants are: wind farm Loma Blanca VI (102MW) in Chubut province, wind farm Los Teros II in Buenos Aires province (52.4MW), wind farm Kosten (24MW) in Chubut, biogas plant San Martín Norte III D (5.10MW) in Buenos Aires province and biomass plant MM Energía (3MW) in Misiones province. In addition, capacity of solar park Anchipurac in San Juan province was expanded to 3MW from 2.23MW.

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