Source: Elmostrador.cl
The renewable trade associations that sign this note are aware that natural gas will be required during the energy transition. In this sense, we advocate promoting a detailed evaluation of what the role of natural gas and its regulation will be to guarantee that the energy transition occurs within the terms that the available technical studies propose –withdrawal of coal by 2030 and total withdrawal of fossil fuels. around 2040– with the least possible distortions and ensuring a safe, sustainable and economic system. However, we also affirm that the participation of natural gas in the electricity matrix must be subject to the premise of technological neutrality that governs the development and expansion of the national electricity sector, and not under the distortions that have favored it, harming and displacing generation. renewable. Among these, the so-called natural gas inflexibility condition, which allows forcing the use of gas with priority over other renewable energies, causing the dumping of renewable energy and greater polluting emissions.
In a recent column in a national newspaper, the Natural Gas Association (AGN) pointed out that the only realistic alternative to achieve decarbonization goals in Chile would be through the necessary incentive for the use of natural gas. He also alluded to the fact that gas is a fuel with low supply risks thanks to investments in LNG terminals and existing supply contracts. He also mentioned the growing difficulty in developing renewable energy projects in the territory. And, finally, he added that the challenges of the energy transition require encouraging the penetration of renewable energy, where gas would facilitate this penetration.
These statements are not without attention.
First, because gas is a fossil fuel that is not free of polluting emissions, so its promotion is directly detrimental to the carbon neutrality objectives that are pursued with the energy transition.
Second, the supposedly low risks of supplying this fuel are not such, since in recent days it has become clear that, in the face of the current international crisis, the supply contracts have ended up yielding to the economic convenience of the generators to divert them to their best bidder. Added to the above are the well-known risks on imports from Argentina. In the global context, we are also witnessing the complex conditions for the supply of Russian gas to Europe and the consequences that this “new order” can have for the supply of gas to a small country like Chile. In this sense, it must be recognized that there are always gas supply risks associated with the geopolitics of its producing countries.
Third, the mention of the difficulty of development in the territory, evidently, is not an exclusive condition of renewable projects. All technologies must face the challenges of the territory and communities and, surely, a fossil generation source will have requirements and demands according to its impact on its environment. Finally, for every dollar that rises a million BTU in the international price of natural gas, it costs the country 120 MMUSD. Therefore, the cost of gas is not innocuous for the country or for the renewable generation that it displaces. Thus, the so-called inflexibility condition that the regulations give to this fuel should be analyzed as a negative externality whose cost should not be socialized in the system, much less in the renewable park in the context of a decarbonization public policy.
The renewable trade associations that sign this note are aware that natural gas will be required during the energy transition. In this sense, we advocate promoting a detailed evaluation of what the role of natural gas and its regulation will be to guarantee that the energy transition occurs within the terms that the available technical studies propose –withdrawal of coal by 2030 and total withdrawal of fossil fuels. around 2040– with the least possible distortions and ensuring a safe, sustainable and economic system.
However, we also affirm that the participation of natural gas in the electricity matrix must be subject to the premise of technological neutrality that governs the development and expansion of the national electricity sector, and not under the distortions that have favored it, harming and displacing generation. renewable.
Among these, the so-called natural gas inflexibility condition, which allows forcing the use of gas with priority over other renewable energies, causing the dumping of renewable energy and greater polluting emissions.We also maintain that any contribution of natural gas to the electricity matrix in the future must be limited to the following:
1. It must not harm the decarbonization process.
2. The use of gas must be flexible, without forcing a dispatch, something that has been shown to be possible, regarding the diversions of LNG ships initially destined for Chile, in addition to various management alternatives in the terminals that have been seen this last year.
3. Likewise, the intraday dispatch of gas must be totally flexible, guaranteeing a total daily cycling that avoids the dumping of renewable energy, considering dispatch parameters in accordance with international standards.
For all of the above, we will continue to advocate for a 100% renewable electricity system with storage, promoting the materialization of the investment plans of our associated companies, with an important multi-technology complementarity to provide basic and variable renewable energy, and flexible, to move and remove hydrocarbons. Thus, as a country, we will be able to displace and withdraw hydrocarbons without exception –coal, gas and diesel– from the Chilean electrical matrix, within the terms that the technical studies that support us indicate –withdrawal of coal by 2030 and total withdrawal of around 2040–, and ratified by a large national and international bibliography that confirms that this option –and not the perpetuation of gas in the electricity matrix– is the most cost efficient and the one that will have the greatest impact on the reduction of emissions from the national electricity sector, a horizon that we must never lose.
Ana Lía Rojas, Chilean Association of Renewable Energies and Storage – ACERA A.G.
Bárbara Pérez, Chilean Solar Energy Association – ACESOL A.G.
Rafael Loyola, Trade Association of Small and Medium Hydroelectric Power Plants – APEMEC A.G.
Cristián Sepúlveda, Concentrated Solar Power Association – ACSP A.G.
Carlos Jorquera, Geothermal Council A.G.