Belo Monte plans solar park to compensate for low production

In search of alternatives to expand its energy generation, the Norte Energia concessionaire, owner of the Belo Monte plant, intends to build a solar park within the area of ​​the hydroelectric plant itself, installed on the Xingu River, in the region of Altamira, in Pará.

Estadão found that a request to build the project had already been sent by the company to the National Electric Energy Agency (Aneel) and that the photovoltaic plant would be built in a space close to the main dam of the hydroelectric plant, more precisely in the village that was specially assembled to shelter thousands of workers during the plant’s construction phase.

The project is still under study, but the plan is that the power of the solar plant can reach 137.48 megawatts (MW), energy that would be enough to serve around 300,000 people.

The information was confirmed by the concessionaire to the Estadão report. “Norte Energia is studying the possibility of installing a solar plant in the area used by Vila Residencial at the time of construction. Because of this, he asked Aneel for the grant in question.”

Alternatives

This is not the first time that the company has sought complementary projects to expand energy generation in the surroundings of Belo Monte. At the end of 2019, the concessionaire even approached the regulatory agency and asked for authorization to build thermal plants – more expensive and more polluting – in the vicinity of the hydroelectric plant. On that occasion, it even requested a change in its bylaws, so that it would no longer be a concessionaire focused on just one enterprise and that it could “invest directly or through participation in other companies, as a wholly-owned subsidiary”.

Asked about its plan to build a thermal plant, Norte Energia stated that “there is no forecast” for this project.

low production

Attempts to increase energy production are directly associated with the limitations of energy production by Belo Monte, a reality that was already known since the project’s conception and that led many engineers to even question the financial viability of the plant.

To make the auction of the hydroelectric plant viable in 2010, the government called state-owned Eletrobras, which holds 49.98% of the concessionaire. Pension funds Petros, from Petrobras, and Funcef, from Caixa, own 20% of the plant. The other partners are Neoenergia, Vale, Sinobras, Light, Cemig and JMalucelli. The concessionaire will operate the hydroelectric plant for a period of 35 years.

After 12 years and more than R$ 40 billion invested in its works, Norte Energia is still looking for other sources of income, while what was already foreseen is confirmed: every year, Belo Monte has to be offline for several months, because of the low volume of water that flows through the Xingu River in the dry season.

The reflection of this strong fluctuation in water flows is the effective volume of energy produced by the hydroelectric plant. With 11,233 MW of power, Belo Monte holds the title of the largest Brazilian power plant – Itaipu has 14,000 MW, but it is binational. But in reality the Norte Energia plant actually delivers only an average of 4,571 MW per year.

At the beginning of this year, during the Xingu flood season, the hydroelectric power plant’s turbines operate close to full load and deliver more than 9,000 megawatts per month.

This generation, however, drops to around 300 MW in months like August, September and October, forcing the shutdown of Belo Monte’s main powerhouse, at the risk of its turbines failing due to the low volume of water.