Renewable energy sources are clean, inexhaustible and increasingly competitive, which is why renewable energy in Spain is on the rise. Moreover, they can be used worldwide, reducing energy dependence, and their production does not generate greenhouse gases or pollutants. For all these reasons, the international community has understood the need to commit to these new energy sources, which has created a favorable political environment for this conversion to renewables.
In addition, the increase in renewable energies in Spain lowers the wholesale price of electricity, dropping approximately 0.4 euros per MWh. It is the only energy that allows the price in the wholesale market to go down, since the increase of any other energy source has an impact on prices with price increases. It is also one of the best ways to combat climate change and the devastating effects of global warming and all that this entails.
For this reason, choosing to consume energy from renewable sources in our organization is a commitment to energy efficiency and to the sustainable future of the planet.
Betting on energy efficiency in your company
Growth of renewable energy in Spain
Energy demand in Spain grew by 0.8% last year, representing some 250.5 TWh, with a generating park that reduced its emissions as energy production by means of coal fell by almost 30%, the rest remaining unchanged except for a slight increase of 0.3% in the use of photovoltaic energy production systems.
In 2016, 41.1% of peninsular electricity production came from renewable energies in Spain. This has led to a decrease in CO2 emissions derived from electricity generation of more than 10 million tons of CO2. All this according to the Advance of the Spanish electricity system report of 2016.
Renewable energy auction in Spain
The next renewable energy auction in Spain will take place in the coming weeks. This 3,000MW auction will not have specific quotas for the different technologies and will take into account the different returns of each technology depending on the hours of operation. After this, and once the authorizations have been received, the installations will be ready and in operation in a period of between 6 and 18 months, depending on the type of installation.
Growth in world energy demand
The Sustainable Energy for All Initiative calls for universal access to energy by 2030, because currently some 1.1 billion people (17% of the world's population) do not have access to electricity. This increase would mark a significant increase in energy demand and the need to increase global energy efficiency so that this increase in energy does not translate into an increase in emissions of polluting gases.
It is therefore very important that technological advances in the elements of electricity generation, and with it, changes in the structure of production, since this represents a third of the total emissions of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. So, if pollution levels are also controlled, this will have an impact on the costs to organizations of these emissions.
Public administrations join renewable energy in Spain
In our country, more than 700 municipalities consume energy 100% from renewable energies in Spain, that is to say, they currently have contracted their electricity supply with marketers certified by the National Commission of Markets and Competition (CNMC) that accredits that the energy they supply is 100% green, that it comes from renewable energy sources. Some examples are the City Council of Madrid, the City Council of Santiago, the City Council of Cadiz or the City Council of Barcelona.
This action is in addition to other measures that are being developed for cities to evolve towards more efficient models, with zero emissions, such as the use of efficient public transport, the use of electric buses is already becoming a reality in cities such as Valladolid, which within the European Remourban project for energy efficiency in cities, has included its first two lines that run on electric buses. Smarkia The company participates in this project as a platform for energy management and measurement of infrastructures, so that not only can consumption be known and thus reduced, but it also allows measuring the impact of the measures taken and working to continue improving on the basis of the data provided by the platform. This project is currently being carried out in Valladolid (Spain), Nottingham (United Kingdom) and Tepebasi (Turkey).
The Netherlands is another example of this, as its railroad network already runs on energy from wind turbines alone, and every hour of windmill operation is enough for a train to cover a distance of some 200 kilometers. It is very important to improve energy efficiency in the transport sector, as it is the largest consumer of energy and the largest emitter of polluting gases into the atmosphere.
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Companies bet on renewable energies
Google announced its commitment to consume 100% clean energy from 2017, and this is a very important step forward, since, although current figures are not known, Google published in 2011 that it was responsible for 0.01% of the world's electricity consumption. It must be said that last year 56% of its consumption came from renewable energy sources, largely from its own power plants under the NEST brand.
Other technology companies that obtain a good part of their energy consumption from renewable energy sources are Facebook, which obtained 67% of its consumption in 2016, or Apple with 83% of its consumption coming from renewable sources, being for the third consecutive year the most environmentally friendly technology company.
Beyond technology companies, these advances can be found in companies in any sector. A more recent example is the NH hotel chain, which, after obtaining 100% of its electricity consumption from renewable sources, has been awarded the Viesgo Green certificate.
Other significant developments, green moments
In 2016, green moments from different places began to follow one another, such as the 107 hours during which Portugal was able to sustain itself solely on electricity from renewables. This considerably surpassed the 24 hours of green energy consumption achieved by Germany a few weeks later. In the case of smaller locations, we find El Hierro, the smallest of the Canary Islands, which has managed to operate for 76 hours with renewable energy in Spain, only with wind and water as energy sources, being almost 45% of the daily electricity demand met with green energy. Another island, but in this case in the Pacific, Ta'u, has achieved energy independence through solar energy, saving 375,000 liters of diesel per year.
And a real benchmark, which spent three hundred days in2015 consuming electricity from renewable sources is Costa Rica, which has been since June 17, 2016 without using hydrocarbons in the process of electricity generation, which made a total of 271 days in the whole year.
For this to be possible, and for renewable energies in Spain to be able to sustain the world's electricity demand, it is necessary to use electricity correctly, consuming only what is really necessary. Every day there are significant energy losses, so active energy management through monitoring and control of consumption is very important. Having energy management systems such as Smarkia in public administrations, communities of neighbors, companies or organizations allows to monitor, control and optimize consumption by carrying out an efficient energy management and ensuring that only what is actually used is consumed.
