Interconexión Electrica S A E S P : ISA launches solar plant for research on distributed energy resources

• ​​The plant has 1.044 solar panels that will cover 12% of the monthly consumption at the ISA Group's Medellín headquarters.
• This solar plant is one of the research projects of the Energética 2030 program, a company-state-academia alliance created to develop a comprehensive transformation proposal for the energy sector in Colombia.
• A reduction of up to 1.427 tons of CO2 is projected for the 25 years of operation of this solar plant.
• Diego Mesa Puyo, Minister of Mines, and Energy and Mabel Torres Torres, Minister of Science, Technology, and Innovation attended the launch of the plant.
• The ISA Group's affiliates INTERCOLOMBIA, XM, and INTERNEXA participated in the project.
• This pilot or microgrid living lab will help the ISA Group conduct research on the development of sustainable energy sources that will contribute to the transformation of the Colombian energy sector.

1.044 solar panels are installed in the solar plant for a total of 402 kW peak power, which will help identify and classify the behavior of large consumers and detect the main aspects to be considered when self-supplying with this type of energy. This plant was designed, built, and implemented by INTERCOLOMBIA.

The microgrid is one of the projects of the Energética 2030 Program, a scientific ecosystem composed of ten research projects led by the Universidad Nacional together with seven other Colombian universities; ISA and its affiliates INTERNEXA, INTERCOLOMBIA, and XM, and twelve foreign institutions of nine countries.

This microgrid will be operated by XM from a control center, which will make the decisions necessary to use the energy in a proper manner, helping identify opportunities for future operation.

INTERNEXA takes part in this project by providing connectivity, exploration of container architectures, and cloud simulation features under a private cloud scheme and software-defined grids, which can even be used in other projects.

The goal of the Energética 2030 Program supported by the Colombian Government through the Ministry of Science, Technology, and Innovation and its Colombia Científica program is to design a comprehensive strategy to transform the sector, making it reliable and socially, economically, and environmentally sustainable by 2030.

For 46 months, more than 150 scientists and researchers of the Energética 2030 Program have been studying the technical, economic, and social aspects of the development of new ways to use, generate, trade, and own energy.

'We are really proud and filled with a sense of responsibility when providing tangible initiatives and ideas, accompanied by these great allies, so that the Colombian government can face energy transformation challenges. Also, this project perfectly fits our 2030 Strategy, which is based on the Green, Innovation, and Development pillars, as it requires a collaboration scheme that generates valuable knowledge, promotes energy efficiency, and generates a positive environmental impact,' Bernardo Vargas Gibsone, ISA Group's CEO, said.

The proper implementation of distributed energy resources with solar energy, including battery energy storage systems, offers available technologies that will help achieve the transformation goals of the energy sector proposed by the Colombian government.

'This project will help promote Colombia's energy transition and the addition of solar and wind renewable energies to our energy mix. Initiatives like this solar plant show that the commitment to renewable energy innovation and development has created an interest that will enable us to continue increasing the installed capacity of this type of sources,' Diego Mesa, Minister of Mines and Energy, said.

Likewise, the project has reduced academia-business gaps by combining the knowledge of both worlds to achieve practical results, with scientific accuracy.

According to Jairo Espinosa, scientist at Energética 2030, 'this microgrid is the result of the academia-company-state joint work. This is an opportunity that represents the ISA Group's commitment to research and creation of new technologies that foster the energy transition, accompanied by the national academia and foreign research centers, united in our 2030 Energy alliance.'

In summary, promoting efficient energy management through distributed solutions as well as large-scale storage are part of the challenges that companies, the state and the academia face together to develop a comprehensive proposal for the transformation of the Colombian energy sector.

Universities associated to Energética 2030

•Universidad Nacional de Colombia

•Universidad Pontificia Bolivariana

•Universidad EIA

•Universidad EAFIT

•Universidad de Sucre

•Corporación Universitaria del Caribe

•Universidad de La Guajira

•Universidad Francisco de Paula Santander

Foreign institutions

•Rwth University Of Aachen, Germany

•Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium

•Eindhoven University Of Technology, The Netherlands

•Delft University Of Technology, The Netherlands

•Washington State University, United States

•Universidad De Zaragoza, Spain

•Forschungszentrum Jülich, Germany

•Dalhousie University, Canada

•Aarhus University, Denmark

•Université De Lausanne, Switzerland

•Duke University, United States

•Energy Ville, Belgium

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