Wind energy is the fastest growing in Brazil

Brazil already has 16 GW of installed wind power. By 2024, the forecast is that the number will reach the mark of 24.4 GW, including auctions that have already been carried out and contracts signed in the free market.

The Infovento newsletter, made by the Brazilian Wind Energy Association, showed that in the last year 55.9 TWh were generated and 9.7% of all generation injected into the National Interconnected System came from the source, which since 2011 has already totaled R $ 31.3 billion in investments. In all, there are 637 wind farms in 12 states, completing 7,738 wind turbines in operation.

Recently, the executive president of Abeeólica, Élbia Gannoum, boasted that the wind turbines represents 9.3% of the country’s electric matrix, behind only the hydroelectric plant, with 59.6%. Gannoum also revealed that in 2019, the wind source grew by 15.5%, while all sources in the National Interconnected System had a growth of 1.5%.

Of the 24.4 GW projected for 2024, 82.2 GW of them will be assigned to the ACL. In 2018, 1.9 GW were contracted for the free market, while in 2019 it grew to 2.9 GW, surpassing the regulated market, which grew 1.8 GW.

Élbia Gannoum believes in a strong movement for the ACL still in 2020, since there will probably be no auction this year. “Wind energy has great potential in the free market”, he reveals. Regarding the impacts caused by the pandemic in the wind farm sector, the executive believes that investments in alternative sources are essential for the recovery of the economy. In 2019, the capacity factor in the country was 42.7%.

Ben Backwell, CEO of the Global Wind Energy Council, revealed that 2020 would be a record year for the wind power industry, with more than 76 GW to be installed. However, with the pandemic, the world expectation was reduced to 61.34 GW. “These wind farm projects are not going to disappear, they are going to pass to 2021”, he comments.

PSR CEO Luís Augusto Barroso revealed that with the expansion of the ACL, the regulated environment will have an increasingly reduced participation. For him, the impacts of hourly prices and the end of subsidies are essential for wind power in the country.