Tuesday, October 10, 2023. While most of the Spaniards were preparing their bags to enjoy one of the great bridges of the year, alarms went off in the control room of the Spanish electricity system.
The production of wind energy was at a minimum throughout the day, the solar allowed to save the central hours of the day, but even the production of electricity from the gas plants at maximum power did not manage to supply the sufficient megawatts of light that Spain demanded that day. "They stopped exports from Red Eléctrica and even had to import energy. The situation was similar to the one that occurred on October 4, 2022, but without the tensions of the war", explains Óscar Barrero, partner in the energy sector at the consulting firm PwC, during the presentation of the Passat report, present and future of combined cycle thermal power plants, published by the Naturgy Foundation.
"This is a situation of stress in the electricity system that is not usual because the low renewable production, the maintenance of many gas plants and the high demand do not usually happen at the same time", points out the report, which details the stressful moments of 2022 and this year.
These specific events may cease to be so in the coming years. Combined cycle power plants, which use gas to produce electricity, are not 100% operational. Some for scheduled maintenance tasks and others for various failures in their operation. Spain has an installed capacity of 24 gigawatts (GW) of combined cycles. Only 21 GW are in effective operation and the actual power they are capable of supplying is no more than 17.7 GW.
The contradiction is that, in a world in which the installation of renewables is intended to triple, combined gas cycles become more essential the more renewables are installed and will be even more so with the planned closures of nuclear power plants.
The latest draft of the National Integrated Energy and Climate Plan (Pniec) 2023-2030 envisages an increase in renewables up to 193.8 GW, but maintains the current 24 GW in combined cycles. The problem is that since 2002 there has been a 13% reduction in the availability of combined cycles, accentuated in the last three years. "Wear is caused by improper use. They were designed to work for a long time in a row and not with starts and stops as is happening more and more", says Luis Carlos Postigo, head of Gas
The PwC report states that current power plants start up an average of 80 a year and some up to 200. Added to this wear and tear is the lack of financial incentives to make new investments. "In a system that is already a bit at the limit and this may pose a problem in the future. Because the power plants will need greater maintenance and the current legislation does not provide for remuneration for this", says Óscar Barrero.
Now, gas plants are financed in proportion to the megawatts of light generated. The needs of the system lead them to generate less MW but to have an increasingly strategic availability. “Capacity markets are critical; if we want to have the support of combined cycles in the face of the deployment of renewables and the requirement is to be available, this must be repaid", says José Luis Gil, director of regulation at Naturgy, who positively values the fact that the Government has taken check a payment mechanism for this availability. The text provides for a fixed remuneration, but the sector demands that it be paid for this availability.
The play is on his side. Two rulings in the last year have endorsed Naturgy in the closure of this type of power plant if they are not profitable, without the need, as until now, to obtain express authorization from the Government.
