Energy company AES Andes has reached commercial operation of a 180MW solar-plus-storage plant in Antofagasta, Chile.
Located in the desert of Atacama, one of the regions with the highest irradiation in the world, the project includes 112MW of energy storage with 5-hour duration. The largest in Latin America, according to the Chilean subsidiary of AES Corporation.
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Construction of the project was initiated in October 2020 and includes 170MW of bifacial panels along with 10MW of modules from Australian energy start-up 5B which manufactures modular ‘plug and play’ solar solutions, a company AES made a strategic investment in 2020.
With commercial operation of the solar plant, AES Andes now has 429MW of solar PV capacity in operation in the northern region of Antofagasta and expects to complete another solar-plus-storage next year with 238MW of solar PV and 147MW of energy storage with five-hour capacity.
Moreover, the company acquired in June a solar park in the region. The Bolero solar park was acquired from EDF EN Chile and Marubeni Corporation and has an installed capacity of 146MW.
This article was first published on our sister site Energy-storage.news with more extensive coverage on the growth of energy storage projects in Chile in the past few months.