Section A Ι Integration of Renewables

Thursday, 22 September 2016, 09:00-9:30h/A01

Wind farms without subsidies: Challenges and risks for the operator

José Ángel Diaz Alvarez, EDP Renováveis S.A., Spain

The regulatory changes adopted in many different geographies, where public support is being reduced or even eliminated, have created a new set of conditions for wind energy projects making them live in a very different environment from the one where the industry was born and quickly expanded.

This situation affects firstly to new projects under development or to be developed, that need to be fully reconsidered in order to secure that they are profitable by themselves with just a small external support or even without any. In some countries not only the new projects are affected, but also the existing ones that are already under operation are facing regulation changes that reduce the support that they were expected to receive when they were originally developed and financed. The change in operating conditions raise many challenges in order to keep the business cases within reasonable values.

This new environment is putting under test the strength of the wind industry, and developers and operators are quickly reacting to these new challenges with several different new ideas and improvements in different fields ranging from technology innovation to asset management, showing the important level of maturity that the wind energy sector has reached.

But any time there are challenges there are additionally some opportunities and all the effort put in facing and overcoming a tougher environment finally results in an increase in the competitiveness of wind energy, by means of that same levers, being innovation a key factor. New ways of developing, constructing and operating wind power plants also help to reduce the cost of wind energy, and as a result we see today that in some areas wind is a more competitive option than conventional energies.