Spain’s Canary Islands to launch its own solar and wind auction, seek exemption from solar tax

The Minister of Energy of the Canary Islands, Pedro Ortega, has met with Spain’s State Secretary of Energy, Daniel Navia, to discuss details of the specific auction for large-scale solar and wind that the government of the archipelago has been planning over the past months.

Canary Islands’ government said it expects to submit the bidding rules for the auction, which will be the first of its kind for the region, to the country’s National Markets and Competition Commission (CNMC) by the end of July.

The auction was originally expected to be launched in the first four months of this year. According to the regional government’s previous statements, projects selected in the auction should be operational by December 2019.

Spanish solar association UNEF hopes the Canary Islands power auction will allow for a substantial percentage of photovoltaics, which is a rational choice given the region’s vast sun resource.

Furthermore, the government of the archipelago said it expects that all solar power generators installed for self-consumption will be exempted by paying the notorious “sun tax”. Spain’s current legislation for self-consumption, in fact, imposes charges on both existing and new installations, both on a capacity and generation level.

The government of the Canary Islands began negotiating on the tax exemption with the government of Madrid in late 2015.

Currently, solar and wind represent only 10% of the installed generation capacity of the islands.