Iberdrola is progressing its plans to increase its market share in the Iberian Peninsula’s electricity market, winning a contract to manage two hydropower plants in Portugal.
The Spanish firm has won a competition organised by Portuguese utility Energias de Portugal (EDP) to operate and market electricity from the Aguieira and Raiva hydropower plants. The award follows on from Iberdrola’s announcement in February that it is to build four new hydropower dams in Portugal.
The tolling agreement with EDP has been approved by Portuguese competition authorities. The two hydro plants – located in the Mondego river basin – have a combined capacity of 360 MW, of which 270 MW is reversible pumping.
Iberdrola says that operating the two plants will give it valuable experience of the Portuguese market during the construction phase of the 1200 MW Alto Támega project. It will manage the two plants for a five year period, starting in April 2009.
The Aguieira and Ravia hydro plants have installed capacities of 336 MW and 24 MW, respectively. The Aguieira plant has a reversible pumping capacity of 270 MW, representing 25 per cent of all pumping capacity of this type in Portugal.
Iberdrola announced in February that it is to invest EUR1.7 billion in the construction of the Alto Támega complex, one of the most important hydropower projects to be undertaken in Europe in the last 25 years. The project involves the construction of four new dams in the Duero Basin between 2012 and 2018.
Two of the new plants will be 900 MW pumped storage facilities and two will be conventional hydro plants with capacities of 234 MW. Combined, the four plants will generate around 2000 GWh/year and will give Iberdrola a 15 per cent share in Portugal’s electricity generation market.
