canary islands renewable energy complementarity study

Why solar and wind together could transform the Canary Islands grid

The challenge of intermittent renewables

It sounds counterintuitive, but there is a way to achieve an electricity system powered by renewables where the difference between energy generated and energy consumed is almost zero: installing solar panels and wind turbines in areas that may not be the most productive or profitable on average, but which generate electricity just when regions with more sun or wind have lost their natural resource. It is called spatiotemporal complementarity. And it aims to correct one of the biggest challenges facing renewables destined to replace fossil fuels, the drivers of global warming: their intermittency. It is not always sunny, and it is not always windy. So compensating means not putting all your eggs in one basket (that is, in the place where both resources are most abundant), but weaving a network of installations where some act as a lifeline for others, until a grid as stable as if we had a constant energy source is achieved. This would help meet the golden rule of the system: that electricity generation equals demand. Otherwise, imbalances could arise from the constant peaks and troughs of renewable production.

Canary Islands at risk of major power imbalance

In the Canary Islands, that mismatch could be between 40 and 50 per cent if the current pattern of installing photovoltaic and wind farms continues, according to a new study. The good news, the research reassures, is that there are solutions. Scientists from the University of Murcia (UM) and the Earth and Atmosphere Observation Group (GOTA) at the University of La Laguna (ULL) have analysed how the archipelago could achieve this goal of spatiotemporal complementarity in two scenarios: one with batteries capable of storing surplus production, and one without them.

How the CLIMAX tool works

The authors of the study used an advanced computer tool called CLIMAX, which cross-references meteorological data with the real electricity consumption curve and evaluates thousands of possible combinations to find the best recipe for renewable installations. The model rules out areas where it is impossible to place them for environmental or administrative reasons. “The approach does not discard the most productive areas, because they guarantee a high average production,” explains Sonia Jerez, lead author of the study and researcher at UM. “But it also includes locations with installations that complement these when the resource fails, with the intention that the combined production should be as close as possible to a firm generation source.” The findings were recently published in the scientific journal Sustainable Energy Technologies and Assessments.

Caveats on inter-island connections

The authors urge caution in interpreting their conclusions due to a methodological limitation: they assume that the Canary Islands’ electricity system is perfectly interconnected, when in reality this is not the case. Only Lanzarote and Fuerteventura, as well as Tenerife and La Gomera (a submarine cable connected them for the first time in February this year), are interconnected. The researchers add that this assumption allowed them to estimate the islands’ maximum potential from an academic rather than a practical point of view. They do, however, clarify that the methodology could be applied individually to each island.

Optimal mix without storage: wind dominates

The study concludes that, in the absence of batteries, the islands’ energy mix should be dominated by wind power, which would supply 60 per cent of the total (48 per cent onshore and 12 per cent offshore), while the remaining 40 per cent would come from solar energy. Photovoltaic panels would be installed mainly between northern Gran Canaria and northeastern Lanzarote.

With storage, solar takes the lead

With large-scale storage systems, however, solar would increase its share to 86 per cent, thanks to the ability to store energy generated during the day for use at night. The optimal areas would be southwestern Tenerife, southwestern Gran Canaria, the north of the round island (Gran Canaria), and a large portion of Lanzarote. The researchers do not specify how many hectares of land would be needed in either case, nor how many megawatts (MW) of capacity. However, they include an alternative approach in their simulations to avoid landscape impact: covering 30 per cent of roofs in urban areas of the archipelago with solar panels. “In this way, practically all the necessary solar share would be achieved,” they note, “so there would be no need to invade new areas.”

A 20-point boost in grid stability

An energy transition of this kind (rebalancing the energy mix and enhancing technology complementarity) would reduce fluctuations in the Canary Islands’ future renewable electricity system by twenty percentage points, the study concludes. In isolated islands, achieving this level of stability and alignment between generation and demand would help deliver the long-sought energy security following the shock of the US and Israel war against Iran.

Balancing landscape and climate goals

Scientist Sonia Jerez finally acknowledges that “any development has a landscape impact,” but urges not to lose sight of the fight against climate change when discussing renewables. “When I see a solar panel installation, I like it. Obviously, I don’t want protected areas or places with native species to be occupied, for example. But they have a connotation that is not only visual but also of protecting the environment,” she points out. In the archipelago, only 22.7 per cent of electricity generation is renewable. The rest comes from fossil fuels such as combined cycle (41.3 per cent), diesel engines (19.7 per cent), and steam turbines (13.5 per cent), according to the latest update from Red Eléctrica.

“It is our lifestyle that is at risk with the climate crisis. I find a shopping centre, I don’t know, much more bothersome. And yet that seems to have greater social acceptance. Any development has an impact. But this one, which has many implicit benefits,” continues the expert. The penetration of renewables in the Canary Islands has been stagnant for years for various reasons: isolated electricity systems, old and inflexible thermal power plants unable to start and stop quickly to favour the entry of solar and wind energy, and a lack of storage, among other things.

Government push for renewable acceleration zones

The Ministry of Ecological Transition of the Government of the Canary Islands, led by Mariano Zapata (PP), is promoting the Renewable Acceleration Zones (ZAR) to speed up their installation, but so far it has faced rejection from the island councils of Fuerteventura and Lanzarote due to a lack of consensus.

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