The Confederation of Industrial Chambers of the United Mexican States – Concamin – answered Manuel Bartlett, director of the electric company, and called him a “liar.”
MEXICO CITY (El Economista) – CFE opens a new dispute with the wind and photovoltaic industry. Although the reliability agreement issued by the National Energy Control Center (Cenace) has been halted for two-thirds of those affected, the new policy will privilege the dispatch of primary energy (typically fossil fuels). With that, a new warning is made for renewable companies that have arrived in the country: the government incentives to connect to the transmission network of the Federal Electricity Commission (CFE) will be eliminated and warned the director-general of the state electricity company, Manuel Bartlett.
The conflict between the government and the private sector that generates renewable energy in the country is centered on two technologies: wind and photovoltaic. According to Cenace, until April this year, there have been 5,930 megawatts of wind energy in 13 states, representing 7.4% of the nearly 80,000 megawatts installed throughout the country. The installed photovoltaic capacity has risen to 3,813 megawatts, multiplying by more than 10 in the last five years. Forty-eight large-scale plants have been established, which are added to the 100,000 permits for distributed generation for solar roofs, a volume that has grown from just 45 licenses since 2009.
Incentives
As has happened almost everywhere globally, renewable generation in Mexico has enjoyed regulatory and tariff impulses, although not direct subsidies. Thus, the Energy Regulatory Commission (CRE) carried out different negotiations from the first wind power installations in the country, 12 years ago, which included Tamaulipas and Oaxaca to create an exchange in which all potential installers would pay for their fraction of the network’s use.
In an interview with Reuters, the general director of the CFE Manuel Bratlett Díaz said that the operation of private companies in Mexico is not a free market, “it is theft” because the CFE pays the incentives for renewals. “Is it fair that the CFE subsidizes these companies that do not produce energy all day? The companies should also help pay the transmission costs,” Bartlett said.
Concamin then responded that private companies operating in the electricity market do pay the CFE for using the transmission lines to transport the energy they produce to their clients. The payment is made monthly according to the regulated rate determined by the CRE. “Bartlett is lying when he insinuates that private companies do not pay to use CFE’s transmission lines,” the Confederation said in a statement.
But yesterday, the CFE countered and stated that the CFE does subsidize renewable energy generators because “the CRE imposes on the CFE to charge these private companies rates that are far below the transmission costs, which are seriously deteriorating their finances. In other words, the CFE is forced to charge private companies less than their operating costs”.
Bartlett claims the CFE is only one that pays for the support in the electricity system, because “when private companies stop producing clean energy, due to lack of sun or wind (intermittent energy), the CFE provides that lack of energy with its resources and infrastructure (support), financing the whole process for the sole benefit of the private companies who, according to Director Bartlett, should participate equitably in the payment of those costs, and then there would be equity in the market.” (SIC).
You be the judge on who is lying.
