A process involving the connection to the power grid of a major green hydrogen project in Brazil is holding up a series of similar ventures that are also awaiting grid access opinions from system operator ONS.
The project in question is a Solatio plant with 3GW of electrolysis capacity, aiming to produce 400,000t/y of green hydrogen and 2.2Mt/y of green ammonia.
Planned to be installed in Piauí state, involving estimated investment of 27bn reais (US$4.8bn), ONS denied the grid connection request at the end of May.
However, the following month, electric power regulator Aneel partially accepted a request by Solatio for a suspensive effect, ordering the halt of other processes that could potentially conflict with the company’s project.
As a result, the ONS suspended the evaluation of five green hydrogen projects from Voltalia, totaling 2.58GW, and one from Casa dos Ventos (1.2GW) at Pecém port in Ceará state.
“In light of this, the ONS expresses its deep concern regarding the impacts caused by the suspension of these processes. Such a measure may pose risks to the regularity and predictability of the standard procedure for transmission system access processes currently underway,” the operator said in a letter sent to Aneel.
Environmental licensing
The Solatio project is facing another issue: earlier this month, the federal public prosecutor (MPF) requested that Piauí suspend the preliminary license for the plant’s installation and that the company halt construction, under penalty of a daily fine of 1mn reais.
According to the MPF, the environmental licensing did not cover water abstraction and wastewater discharge, the power transmission line, the ammonia transport pipeline (ammoniaduct), and ammonia storage at port 12, focusing solely on the green hydrogen and ammonia production plant.
Solatio did not respond to a request for comment by BNamericas.
