Mexico

Enel Green Power hit a number of milestones as it switched on a large-scale solar plant in Mexico, taking its solar portfolio in the country past the 1.3GW mark.

The latest study published by the International Renewable Energy Agency says the average solar electricity cost of $0.085/kWh produced by projects commissioned last year is set to fall to $0.048 next year, and $0.02-0.08 by 2030.

Colombia’s still-dormant solar scene is poised for a major boost under a new partnership, bringing together a European and a Latin American player.

One of the top solar projects supported under Mexico’s now-paralysed auction scheme has been powered up, around two years after development got underway.

The project the company is developing in Juárez will sell energy to the Mexican department store chain El Puerto de Liverpool through a 15-year PPA for the second contract of the type IEnova has secured with the group.

Mexico’s state-run utility and fossil fuel infrastructure need more time before the country can re-arrange the renewable auction it cancelled this year, a top official has said.

Fotowatio Renewable Ventures (FRV) has lined up finance for a major bifacial solar project it will develop in Mexico’s centre without the help of subsidies.

Mounting systems specialist STI Norland said it had surpassed 3GW of cumulative installations with 1.2GW of contracted mounting systems orders expected in 2019.

Fully tapping into Latin America’s bullish solar market will require challenging preconceptions around a region that is more stable than is sometimes assumed, local operators have told PV Tech.

In the early years of the 21st century, distributed generation systems in Latin America were mainly installed off-grid in remote rural areas, writes Maria Chea, solar analyst at IHS Markit. As the El Niño phenomenon and high oil prices continued to exacerbate high electricity prices and power shortages, governments began to turn their attention to distributed generation, including PV systems, to assuage strains on their national grid networks.

Atlas Renewable Energy has landed a long-term PPA agreement with utility Engie Energía, which will help support the development of a 230MW-plus solar farm in Chile.

Mexico should aim to nurture a national solar industrial ecosystem to ensure it captures the full benefits of the renewable technology, a top government official has said.