This change aims to modernize the voltage control service, encourage skill development in all technologies, and potentially reduce associated costs.
Renewable energy units (solar or wind) will be able to control the voltage of the power grid in Spain on equal circumstances with other conventional production technologies, the country’s regulatory entity announced on Thursday.
The National Commission of Markets and Competition (CNMC) of Spain informed Thursday about the change and said it approved the revision of the regulatory framework for voltage control obligations on June 12, before the first official conclusions of the causes of the Iberian Peninsula on April 28 were known.
According to these conclusions, the blackout occurred by a voltage overload that the Spanish electrical system could not absorb failures in the planning of Red Electric company – the Spanish network operator – and by obligation defaults by energy -producing companies with conventional technologies that had been requested to control the voltage.
Currently, CNMC explained, both synchronous (thermal and hydraulic) production, and asynchronous (solar or wind) have already have voltage control obligations – since 2000 and 2014, respectively – but with the revision of the regulatory frame now announced by the operator similarly and on equal circumstances.
A “homogeneous” treatment
This “homogeneous treatment” translates into similar incentives for all production technologies when they are called to activate units to control tension.
According to CNMC, all units continue to be required to make a basic service available, but they may now all participate in the voltage control planning, under guidelines defined by the system operator.
The revision of the technical standards approved on June 12 aims to modernize and provide a retributive frame the Spanish power grid voltage control service, the Spanish competition authority said.
Measure aims to encourage all energies
With this change, the Spanish authorities intend to introduce dynamism into the power grid voltage control service and also encourage the development of more capacities by all technologies.
The now approved review resulted from an initial proposal from the Electric System Operator of June 2021 and 2022 and 2023 “demonstration projects” were launched, which proved the ability of renewables to provide the voltage control service in a dynamic and “high economic efficiency”.
The Spanish Photovoltaic Union (UNEF) welcomed this Thursday with the approval of these changes by CNMC, stressing that renewables have been “for many years” technical capacity to contribute to control of voltage in the electrical system, but could not do so far because of regulatory staff.
According to UNEF, the participation of renewables in voltage control will also contribute to control costs associated with this service, which in Spain has multiplied for ten in recent years.
On the other hand, the Association highlighted in comments sent to the EFE News Agency, that tension control has a strong geographical component and, in this context, photovoltaic is “particularly well adapted” to contribute to this service.
