Colombia’s largest PV plant comes online

From pv magazine Latam

U.S.-based energy company AES, which in May changed the name of its unit in Latin America from AES Gener to AES Andes, has inaugurated and put into operation, on Friday, the San Fernando Solar Park, the largest photovoltaic project in Colombia.

AES built the plant for Colombian oil company Ecopetrol, which entered the solar energy business in August 2018.

Located in the municipality of Castilla La Nueva, in the department of Meta, the new solar complex has 61 MW of installed capacity and is the largest PV plant built in the country to date. It will supply part of the energy needed for the company’s operations in the region. Ecopetrol awarded the plant construction contract to AES last year.

The park was built on 57 hectares with 114,000, 530 W monocrystalline bifacial solar panels mounted on trackers. AES said in a statement that the sun-tracking technology with bifacial panels is the first installed in the country, “which makes San Fernando Solar the most innovative solar plant in Colombia.”

As part of AES Colombia’s commitment to its sustainable operation, the construction of the San Fernando Solar Park involved more than 700 people, of which 88% were local and regional employees. In addition, 38% of the park’s workforce were women, which is the equivalent of more than 270 employees who were part of the different construction areas of the project.

For the CEO of AES Andes, Ricardo Falú, “this initiative is a faithful reflection of the progress of our Greentegra transformational strategy, which seeks to reduce the carbon intensity of our portfolio, make the supply of our clients more sustainable, and strengthen the investment grade of the company.”