MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency
Uruguay puts a 65 dollar per MW-hour cap for developing wind power projects
The country is inviting bids for projects totalling 450 MW wind power Uruguay won’t accept bids above 65 dollars a megawatt-hour from developers bidding to sell power from wind farms as concerns mount that rates have dropped too low.
Companies may submit bids Dec. 15 for projects totalling 450 megawatts of capacity, the country’s power utility monopoly UTE said on its website.
Uruguay wants developers to build as many wind farms as they can after slowing demand growth for turbines in the US and Europe drove down prices, according to Pablo Caldeiro, an engineer from the Ministry of Industry, Energy and Mining.
Prices for wind turbines have dropped 24% to about 920,000 Euros (1.25 million dollars) a megawatt from 2008.
Rates for wind-power fell as low as 63 dollars a megawatt-hour in Uruguay’s previous auction for projects with 150 megawatts of capacity, the Ministry of Industry, Energy and Mining said Aug. 23 on its website.
Wind developers in Brazil agreed to deliver electricity at an average price of 99.54 Reais (56.51 dollars) a megawatt-hour in a government-organized auction August 18, the lowest nationwide rate for wind energy, according to New Energy Finance.
Top Comments
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Read all commentsThe first question UTE should ask is why have the prices of turbines fallen? The answer is very simple: these devices do not work efficiently and those countries which have fallen for the climate change lies are now realising this - to their cost and have stopped buying them.
Nov 20th, 2011 - 11:14 am 0What happens when they stop working, either because there is no wind or the wind is too strong and the machinery cannot cope? Answer, stand-by resources are needed, otherwise you reduce capacity and risk outages.
The whole concept of these things is flawed and I am a little suprised that Uruguay has fallen for them given the mass of evidence available as to their unsuitability. The UK is presently locked in a two pronged financial penalty for the population: the Labour Government subsidies encouraged the growth of these things (paid for out of taxes) and their abysmal performance (less than 7% of power generation) has landed the generators with excess costs - paid for by their customers - who also happen to be tax payers.
This decision is a disaster in the making. It would be better to pay the transmision cost blackmail to Argentina and use hydro power.
I am a professional electrical-mechanical engineer.
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