Honduras inks geothermal studies deal

Honduras’ state power company Enee and consultancy Geokeri signed a contract to further define the country’s geothermal energy potential.

The work will take seven months and entails carrying out final feasibility studies in the municipalities of Namasigüe and El Triunfo in Choluteca department, Enee said in an update.

Enee’s small plants unit will provide technical and logistical support and German development bank KfW has provided funds.

Geothermal power represents 1% of Honduras’ installed generation capacity and comes from Ormat Technologies’ 35MW Platanares plant.

Meanwhile, the government reported that China Energy Engineering was the winner in Enee’s call issued last year to supply and install combined cycle generation units and substation equipment for the expansion of thermal plants La Puerta and Ceiba.

The additional capacity totals 80MW and is due online in 2026. Estimated investment reaches 3bn lempiras (US$122mn).

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Guatemala’s wholesale market administrator AMM launched bidding to conduct a study to determine the annual investment and cost of operating and maintaining the power transmission system in 2025-26.

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Central America power interconnection commission CRIE approved a modification to the methodology used to calculate the discount rate, consultation for which began last quarter.

The change introduces a control band to prevent excessively high values that could lead to the non-adoption of “socially desirable projects” or low values that could result in economically inefficient projects.