Lampa, October 18, 2017 – Pierre Boulestreau, the Chief Executive Officer of CVE Chile, Pierre de Froidefond and Hervé Lucas, two of the three co-founding partners of Cap Vert Energie, inaugurated the photovoltaic power plant of Valle de la Luna, in the presence of Caroline Dumas, the French Ambassador to Chile;
The Valle de la Luna photovoltaic solar plant, with an installed power of 3 MW, is a decentralized production unit (PMGD) with a low environmental impact (limited power transmission), located in the community of Lampa, 40 km from Santiago. The unit will produce 6.8 GWh (gigawatt-hours) of renewable electricity in a full year, enough to power 5000 homes.
The Cap Vert Energie Group has built a presence in Chile in the decentralized production unit market[1]. CVE Chile is targeting the Santiago region, where most of the country’s energy demand comes from. This strategy is in line with Cap Vert Energie’s vision of decentralized electrical production sold directly to businesses. That’s because after four years of selling energy via the stabilized price mechanism, CVE Chile will sell its renewable electricity directly to companies in the Santiago region through private Power Purchase Agreements (PPA), which are long-term contracts that set a sales price between the electricity producer and the electricity consumer.
Created in 2016, CVE Chile now has five employees, and operates three ground-based photovoltaic units in the metropolitan region, 40 km from Santiago, Chile: Quinta Solar (2.99 MW), San Francisco Solar (2.99 MW), and Valle de la Luna II (2.99 MW). With about 30 PMGD plants currently in operation in Chile, CVE Chile is positioned as a leading player in this market. The goal is to achieve an operating power of 200 MWp by 2022.
The Cap Vert Energie Group’s choice of sites in Chile, as well as the United States (in the states of New York and Massachusetts) came about through market research and through analyzing public policies and local climate conditions. “Chile gets an ideal amount of sun (about 3400 kWh/m²/year), and has a direct energy sales model and a subsidy-free market. This is in keeping with out strategic vision for developing renewable energy“, explained Pierre Boulestreau