According to bnamericas.com, Mexico’s Yucatán peninsula will continue to suffer natural gas shortages in 2019, warned the head of the Yucatán branch of business owners association Coparmex, José Antonio Loret de Mola.
Construction of the Cempoala gas pipeline, which is key to transporting natural gas to the peninsula, is not advancing on schedule due to resistance from communities over whose land the pipeline must pass through, Loret de Mola was reported as saying by daily El Financiero.
When completed, the Cempoala pipeline and compressor station will enable natural gas from Texas to be taken to the Yucatán peninsula via Transcanada‘s soon-to-be-completed Texas-Tuxpan marine pipeline.
The lack of natural gas in this part of southeastern Mexico has forced thermoelectric plants to use diesel fuel, raising generation costs and leading to high power rates for consumers. These same high rates are expected to catalyze demand for distributed solar generation systems on the peninsula.
The new head of state-run electricity utility CFE, Manuel Bartlett, has singled out the incapacity of the previous Enrique Peña Nieto administration to complete its private sector-driven natural gas pipeline construction program despite contractual terms in which the CFE is paying for natural gas which is not being delivered.
According to local media, the pipeline program will be audited by the new government of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador.
By Feike De Jong for bnamericas.com
Source: https://bnamericas.com
