Renewable energies are the only source of electricity that managed to grow during 2020, despite the health emergency due to the coronavirus.
The increase in demand for renewable energies –mainly solar and wind- was experienced worldwide, according to data from the International Energy Agency (IEA). And Mexico, based on data from the National Energy Control Center (Cenace), was no exception, despite the latest regulatory movements aimed at restricting the use of renewable methods, to increase the use of fossil fuels.
During 2020, the production of electricity through sun and wind registered its fastest growth rate in recent decades, at 45%, derived from investments made in the sector before the pandemic, mainly in the United States and Europe.
In Mexico, last year the health emergency coincided with a series of changes made by the executive to modify the rules of the electricity market and thus give priority in the dispatch – the order in which electricity is used – to the plants owned by the Federal Commission of Electricity (CFE).
But despite this, renewable energies, mainly solar, added significant growth and took a lot of market share away from other fuels, mainly coal.
Thus, throughout last year, wind power generation added an increase of 18% compared to 2019, according to data from Cenace, the market operator. Electricity via solar plants increased 61% and in contrast other fossil fuels fell significantly.
Just a few months before, the executive had promoted a series of measures that were intended to change the dynamics of the electricity market, which were finally suspended by judges in competition matters, who remain in the same state.
Charcoal
Comparing December 2020 with the same month a year earlier, the use of wind power plants increased by 33% and the use of photovoltaic plants by 40%, based on data from Cenace.
The greater use of these plants is explained by the cost of electricity production, which is much lower than that registered in the use of fuel oil, diesel or coal. Current regulation establishes that the lower cost energies will be the first to be used, thus the higher cost energies remain at the end of the row.
The IEA, based in Paris, assures that the growth seen in 2020 could be repeated in the following years derived from the actions carried out jointly, between governments and companies, towards the economic recovery after the pandemic, in which renewable energies will play a substantial role as an investment motive, and as part of global efforts to combat climate change.
“Governments around the world have auctioned record levels of renewable capacity and companies have signed record-level power purchase agreements, even as the pandemic spread macroeconomic uncertainties and suppressed demand,” the organization explained in a study published ago. some weeks.
In Mexico, a recent study carried out by the Mexican Institute of Competitiveness (IMCO) indicates that the constant growth of renewable energies is due to the policies implemented during previous governments and the suspensions dictated by the judiciary that have left all the regulatory changes coming from the executive, mainly the reform to the Electricity Industry Law approved last March and suspended during the same month.
“Given that electricity generation depends on investment decisions and the development of multi-year projects initiated several years before a plant begins to operate, the increases in the share of clean generation in the country’s total electricity generation are a consequence of the climate investment and the legal and regulatory framework in force until at least three years ago ”, said the IMCO in its most recent study on the subject.
This reform seeks to change the way in which the energy generated in power plants is taken, to put in the foreground the electricity produced by in the plants of the state-owned CFE. A setback in the decision of the judges specialized in competition, who until now have slowed down the reform, would change the growth rate of renewable methods.
