Barbados’ energy goals slightly behind target

by Marlon Madden

Barbados is trailing slightly behind its targets to achieve 100 per cent reliance on renewable energy by 2030, as outlined in the implementation plan of the revised National Energy Policy 2019-2030.

However, Claire Best, Monitoring and Evaluation Specialist in the Ministry of Energy, Small Business and Entrepreneurship, is giving the assurance that the goal of Barbados becoming 100 per cent fossil free by 2030 was still achievable.

During a recent episode of the Barbados Manufacturers’ Association (BMA) InFocus series, Best disclosed that this year, year two of the plan, the country had so far achieved 52 megawatt (MW) of installed photovoltaic (PV) installation and about 5MW of storage capacity.

“At year two we were supposed be at 64 megawatts of installed PV and 20 megawatts of installed storage . . . So we are not there,” said Best.

However, she quickly pointed out that the same implementation plan made allocations for other scenarios, adding that while installations were being done Government also had to put various measures in place for the sector including regulations and policies. Best added that the build out of the renewable energy sector required hefty sums, suggesting that this could also be why the installation process was not further along.

“So, what we are trying to do now as a goal is to finish that ground work so that we can have then, a faster transition in the second half of this policy,” she said.

“So, we are doing what is like ‘the low hanging fruit’ – working behind the scenes to get the rest of the stuff in place – new licenses for the utility to accommodate the independent power producers . . .

So, we are working on those kinds of regulation and those kinds of licenses. Agreements have to be put in place for that while we do the low hanging fruit. So, our goal is to make sure that we do what we need to do to get where we need to get by 2030,” she explained.

According to the implementation plan of the national energy policy, the estimated cost of achieving 100 per cent renewable energy use by 2030 is about $4 billion, while the estimated economic benefit annually is estimated to average about $3.9 million over the 10-year implementation period, which can be attributed to a release of resources used to import fossil fuels.

According to the document, “it was found that greater local investment might result in greater local benefits, whereas greater foreign investment means less benefits being retained locally”

While the plan includes targets based on various estimates and assumptions, it noted that over the first five years, 295MW of renewable energy was one possible scenario, consisting of 160MW of solar PVs and a minimum of 120MW of wind as well as 80MW of energy storage.

This would result in 688 Gigawatt hours (gWh) of electricity from renewable energy sources in the first five years of implementation, before going to about 1400gWh by 2030 if the desired renewable energy mix is achieved. Up to 2017, it was estimated that the demand for electricity was recorded to be around 944 gWh in Barbados.

Up to 2015, it was estimated that households accounted for the majority percentage of electricity consumption at 33 per cent, followed by businesses (21 per cent); the public sector at 16 per cent, hotels at 15 per cent, industrial (nine per cent), while other accounted for six per cent.

In addition to the plan for 32MW of electricity from PV systems per year for the first five years, the implementation plan explained that 120MW of electricity from wind energy should be commissioned in year four, and 15MW of electricity from bio-energy in year five.

“Solar photovoltaic will require a minimum of 160 MW to be installed while a minimum of 120 MW of wind will need to be installed to achieve the target of 100 per cent renewable energy by 2030. The 295 MW in the first five years will represent 46 per cent of the total capacity energy mix,” the document said.

“The baseload technologies which accounts for 15 MW of the total capacity, given their nature, will require more planning and construction time and consequently are scheduled to be commissioned in year five of the implementation period,” it added.

The implementation plan found that solar photovoltaic facilities will need a minimum of 317 acres while wind technology will require around 50 acres for the current scenario to be achievable.

“The estimated total spatial requirement for renewable energy generation facilities is 758 acres. Land requirements for biomass are based on requirements for feedstock. The implementation plan estimates between 25, 000 to 28,000 acres necessary for biomass feedstock (sugar cane and king grass) and food,” it added.

During the BMA series, Best pointed out that the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic had not impacted the installation of renewable energy systems commissioned by the ministry, while the effects from Hurricane Elsa at the beginning of July this year on systems for which the Ministry of Energy has responsibility was mainly to cables.

“So between Elsa, the volcanic ash (from the La Soufrière volcano) and the pandemic, the renewable energy installations have been able to manage okay,” she said, explaining that “the ash was a little more tricky because that fell on the PV systems and if you could see it, the production just went down”.

“However, we had heavy rains a few days after and the production ramped right back up. So even though we had a rough year with COVID, Elsa and the ash, after Elsa we did not lose any of the PV systems that we had installed. Our systems on installation are supposed to be able to withstand up to a Category 3,” said Best.

marlonmadden@barbadostoday.bb