Three projects from the 2019 auction begin to be turned off

The three projects of solar trina that participated in the 2019 auctions are facing serious difficulties. In addition to not having obtained the licenses yet, with which they have not been able to start construction, the solar parks have already had to start delivering energy to their customers due to the commitments that had been made.

Is about 300 megawattsof the proyects San Felipe, Cartago and Campanolocated in tolima, Valle del Cauca and Cordobarespectively.

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Although Trina sold the projects to the US fund TPG Capital in 2020, the truth is that the company was in charge of the development processes as well as their construction.

As these have not been able to start delivering energy, the company has had to buy it, initially from January 2022 through the stock market. However, in January of this year it launched a tender to buy 655 gigawatt hours (GW/h) with a start of energy delivery from 2023 and 2025 to finish deliveries in 2036.

Now, Portfolio learned that the process called had been canceled by Trina, in a communication addressed to potential stakeholders in the process.

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To this is added that XM informed the company that it had to pay guarantees since it failed to comply with the payment of market guarantees that They had due date for twenty-one February of this year.

“On March 1, a request was made to issue extraordinary guarantees to Trina Solar’s counterparties, since Trina failed to pay the guarantees due on February 21. On March 2, with the latest liquidated information available on the stock price, the request for extraordinary guarantees was cancelled, since the current coverage of the guarantees covers the transactions of this company.”XM reported.

Days after the electricity market operator announced this, the entity reported that the three projects that are buying energy on the stock market entered into a supply limitation procedure in the spot market.

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This means that the supply contracts that are not being paid are suspended, with which the company is completely exposed to the stock market, by losing the coverage that had been acquired. This occurred while the stock price had an increase. However, a drop in the spot price led the company to come out of supply limitation and according to XM it is currently up to date.

The company has not yet made a public statement regarding its obligations to the market. Although Portfolio learned that the market is concerned about the energy that was acquired in the competitive process.

San Felipe, Cartago and Campano in charge of the company acquired a series of obligations with energy trading companies. According to documents from the cregSan Felipe, a project of 99 megawattsacquired obligations with 23 clients, such as In it, EPM, celsia, among other. In the case of Carthage, also of 99 megawatts, your energy is sold to 22 customers. Finally, Campano also has commitments with 22 companies.

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Among the requirements that generators are required to apply to an auction process is a guarantee of seriousness of the offer. In the case of these three projects, they are backed by guarantees issued by Davivienda.

According to XM, so far none of the company’s energy buyers have requested the execution of the guarantees, in view of the fact that there has not yet been a default in the supply of energy.

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At the time, the company sold for between $93.8 and $99.2 per kilowatt, a price that was considered low at the time, taking into account that according to the auction documents the average allocation was $160. It should be remembered that this price is increasing with indexing and Cere, so according to Jorge Sierra, CEO of Enersinc, the price may be above $200 today, but still below the more than $300 that are buying energy on the stock market.

DANIELA MORALES SOLER
Journalist Portfolio