The Latin American Wind Energy Association has reported that the Inter-American Development Bank (IADB) and the European Investment Bank (EIB) have approved a loan of $130 million to finance the installation of wind farms in the Dominican Republic.
The island’s National Energy Commission (CNE) said that the wind farms will be built in Monte Cristi in the north of the country, and Bani and Barahona in the south. LAWEA explains that the development funding from the IDB and the EIB will be available in four or five months, and the wind farms will add 113 megawatts (MW) of electricity to the island’s grid.
By 2012, it is estimated that the Dominican Republic will have 250 MW of wind power, equivalent to 10 percent of its energy matrix. In Brazil, ENERGIMP, the Brazilian Power company controlled by Industrias Metalúrgicas Pescarmona and FI-FGTS, has signed an agreement with the Caixa Econômica Federal de Brasil to obtain financing from the Banco Nacional de Desenvolvimento Econômico e Social (BNDES) for $300 million.
LAWEA reveals that these funds will be used to develop seven new wind farms in the municipalities of Acaraú and Acaratí, in the state of Ceará, in north-eastern Brazil. The wind farms are to begin operations in 2012 with a total installed capacity of 211 MW, which will bring ENERGIMP's total installed wind capacity in the country to 532 MW.
“With these projects, the population served with clean renewable energy will be in the order of half a million households,” says LAWEA. In addition to the above-mentioned wind farms, the permits for which were awarded through the 2009 Reserve Energy Auction, contracts have been signed for 10 wind farms with 148 generators and 222 MW of installed capacity in the state of Santa Catarina, and 9 wind farms with a total of 270 MW in the states of Ceará and Río Grande do Norte. The financing process of these projects is nearing completion.
Neighbouring Argentina, meanwhile, is turning to foreign funding to boost its wind capability. The Chinese company, XCMC China, has announced that it will invest $200 million in a partnership with Cooperativa Eléctrica de Tres Arroyos (CELTA) to install 50 2-MW wind turbines on a new wind farm in the Reta region, south of Buenos Aires. The President of the Board of Directors of CELTA, Nicholas Ambrosius, said that they have been working for two years on this wind energy project in the coastal district of Tres Arroyos.
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