The desert soil of Puerto Peñasco, Sonora, has been hiding one of the most ambitious green projects of the Government of López Obrador for months.
In the middle of nowhere, under a scorching sun and among heavy machinery, dozens of rows of Chinese solar panels wait to be turned on.
At his side, a handful of engineers are supervising the final details ahead of the inauguration of the first phase of what will be the largest photovoltaic park in Latin America and the seventh largest in the world when it reaches its completion: 1,000 megawatts of capacity on an area of 2,000 acres.
Although now there is only a horizon of sand, dunes and biznagas.
After 13 months of engineering and construction, the first phase of this solar plant will come into commercial operation next April, which will flourish under the shelter of the desert sun in an arid landscape and an extreme climate.
In this first phase, only 120 megawatts will be turned on.
To date, 840 million dollars of the total budgeted 1,600 million dollars have been invested.
The plant will be owned by the Federal Electricity Commission (CFE) and the State of Sonora.
Stage one also contemplates the construction of an associated 25-kilometer transmission line through which the generated electricity will be delivered to the States of Sonora, Chihuahua and Sinaloa.
In the prelude to the starting signal for the flagship green project of the federal Administration, Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard invited ambassadors and diplomats this Thursday to see first-hand the plain covered with solar cells that break with their symmetry the harmony of the tourist complexes that unfold along the coastal municipality.
Accompanied by the United States ambassador to Mexico, Ken Salazar, the governor of Sonora, Alfonso Durazo, and a large diplomatic corps from 80 different countries, the federal official boasted of Sonora as a regional benchmark for sustainable projects that will be developed in the country.
"The message today is that Sonora is the main producer of solar energy in Latin America and in the coming months it will be the main generator of new initiatives in electromobility in the country,"
Sonora has plenty of hours of sunshine —it concentrates around 20% of all photovoltaics in the country—, but it is one of the areas with the greatest electricity congestion, that is, more is produced than is consumed and what is capable of to transport to other regions.
This combination depresses prices in the market.
However, the Governor of the State, Alfonso Durazo, has insisted on the presentation of the progress of the project this Thursday, the viability of the photovoltaic park and has even advanced that this megapark, which in its final stage, will accumulate a generation of 1 gigawatt, It will be the first of five photovoltaic parks to be built in the State.
The US ambassador to Mexico, Ken Salazar, the governor of Sonora, Alfonso Durazo and the foreign secretary, Marcelo Ebrard, during a tour of the facilities.RAQUEL CUNHA (AFP)
The project has also included 648 kilometers of transmission lines, four electrical substations and 192 megawatts of installed battery capacity to provide backup services.
The Government has placed special emphasis on the exit routes that photovoltaic generation will have, one of the main questions raised by experts about the project, who do not doubt the energy potential of the State, but fear congestion due to the little electricity distribution infrastructure .
However, the central Administration assures that at the same time that the solar cells are put up, the high voltage lines will also be built.
Juan Antonio Fernández, CFE's corporate director of strategic planning, explained that the second stage of the first phase began last September and is expected to conclude in June 2024, and emphasized that interconnection will be achieved with this generation for the first time. between the electrical system of Baja California Sur with the rest of the country.
The promoters of the photovoltaic park have also alluded to the 2,000 jobs generated with this initiative for a municipality of some 62,000 inhabitants who live mainly from fishing and tourism.
In a government that at the same time has promoted the generation of electricity with fossil sources, from combined cycle power plants, the development of this photovoltaic megapark will mean a leap in solar generation in Mexico.
Currently, solar electricity represents only 6.1% of the total of the entire electricity generation park, with a total of 5,955 megawatts installed compared to the more than 33,000 installed megawatts of combined cycles, according to figures from the Ministry of Energy. .
After years of firm bets on hydrocarbons and obstacles to private investment in the energy sector, the next start of this green project seems like a change of direction of the federal Administration to promote green energy.
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