Roundup: María Elena Solar sale, US$500mn renewables projects, DG law adhesion

María Elena Solar

Chilean holding company Copec landed the assets of bankrupt power firm María Elena Solar following a liquidation process.

Copec, whose units operate in areas including fuel retail, distributed generation, energy storage, electromobility and logistics, is acquiring the 123MW Granja Solar PV park in Tarapacá region and an associated substation and 23km transmission line.

“This investment is aligned with the strategy of Copec to offer its clients a portfolio of energy services, which will permit them to meet their needs and will support them, efficiently, in the energy transition,” Copec said in a statement. 

A unit of Spain’s Solarpack, María Elena Solar went bust last year amid a perfect storm of curtailment and price decoupling that impacted debt servicing capacity.

Juan Tagle, partner and energy practice director at Chilean law firm Prieto, recently said that potential buyers were considering incorporating energy storage into Granja Solar to support profitability.  

Renewables projects greenlit

Three renewable energy projects with a combined price tag of US$500mn were granted an environmental license in Chile this week.

The biggest by required outlay is the US$248mn Antofagasta solar PV-battery storage project Parina Solar, planned by Statkraft. Parina involves a 248MW solar park along with 348 battery storage modules of 2.08MWh capacity each, with estimated injection duration of four hours, according to documents filed with environmental review agency SEA.

With a price tag of US$130mn, Los Alpes is part of the Alpaca portfolio of Atlas Renewable Energy. Work involves installing 106MW of wind capacity in La Araucanía region. 

The US$120mn Terrazas project, the third biggest approved this week by outlay and planned by Andes Mainstream, involves installing 167MW of solar PV capacity in Coquimbo region, along with a battery system with six-hour injection duration, according to company documents. 

Distributed generation

Argentine province Santa Fé has adhered to federal distributed generation law No. 27,424.

User-generators under the framework are eligible for income tax and VAT exemption on revenue obtained from electricity injections into the grid, according to the federal energy department's distributed generation web portal.

A distributed generation pioneer, Santa Fé already has a program for user-generators, known as ERA and managed by provincial energy firm EPE. Offering a special injection rate regime, ERA is open to users with solar, wind and biomass-based installations. 

Legislation passed in the jurisdiction also establishes that new provincial public buildings must have some kind of renewable energy generation system.

Argentina’s installed distributed generation capacity under law No. 27,424 climbed 63.7% to 30.7MW last year, according to data from the federal energy department.

At the end of February, capacity had risen to 35.2MW, corresponding to 1,679 user-generators across 15 participating provinces. 

Córdoba province accounts for the biggest chunk of installed distributed generation capacity under the law, at 14.5MW.

Slashing of electricity subsidies in Argentina and the impact this could have on offtake and injection prices may spur adoption of distributed generation systems.