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Energy
Sea, sun and wind to meet most power needs within five years Continued from page 20
He emphasised: “The government doesn’t have a problem in having that power station running at a reduced capacity if what we are doing is using renewables, so the priority would go to renewables, and instead of firing up six engines, we maybe only fire two or three.”
With the generating cost of electricity subsidised by at least 50%, the government is looking to save money by setting up power purchase agreements with providers at undis- closed – but much lower – cost “with people who invest their own money, or we could actually build the solar power plant and then [the energy] is free for us.”
EU funds are available to part-finance strategic investment in public sector and private business renewable energy schemes until 2020 - unaffected by Brexit issues.
Price cuts expected
Dr Cortez said: “I am confident renewables will kick in in a big way and that the price of energy production using gas rather than diesel, is going to be considerably less than solely diesel - about 60% less” – but, he added: “Certainly I don’t predict anything
happening [on prices] before we have the gas power station running for at least a year – so about 2019-20; it might be achievable before then, but I don’t know.”
Bravermann told international guests at the EWP launch: “We have projects with a total of 111MW capacity in the pipeline around the world – a lot of deals are maturing as a result of this [Gibraltar] successful development programme.”
Now a Chinese firm that made contact through the Gibraltar office in Hong Kong, has said it is interested in providing lighting consumables in all of public buildings and public areas. “We have sent them information and they are looking at what it would cost them. They would supply fittings and LED bulbs and then take a proportion of the sav- ings we would make in reduced costs of power usage”, the Minister revealed.
A Climate Change Action Plan that will set formal targets and seek to get the private sector actively involved in energy efficiency has been prepared for submission to the government cabinet over the summer, with the expectation that it will be published by year-end. Ray Spencer
Floaters produce power from waves at EWP pilot installation
– “and that seems to be a while away” – GibElec, the power company, requires traditional generating methods as a backstop.
Given that Gibraltar plans new developments, power demand is likely to increase, Dr Cortez reasoned, and “it makes economic sense when building a power station to future proof it by having more capacity than you expect to see in [its] lifespan.”
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