Rolls-Royce and TSK to Deliver Five Power Plants, 475 MW of Backup Capacity for Chile's National Electricity Grid

A consortium comprising EPC contractor TSK and Rolls-Royce has signed an engineering, procurement and construction (“EPC”) contract with Prime Energía Quickstart Spa, a subsidiary of Prime Energia SpA (“Prime Energía”), for the construction of five power plants across Chile consisting of 265 MTU Onsite Energy 16V 4000 gensets. Prime Energía is a subsidiary of the New York-based Glenfarne Group, LLC (“Glenfarne”), a developer, owner-operator and industrial manager of energy and infrastructure assets. Prime Energía’s five power plants will offer a total combined capacity of 475 MW, which will be connected to Chile’s electricity grid to provide backup capacity to the country’s power supply system.

Brendan Duval, Managing Partner of Glenfarne, said: “These plants are an integral part of Glenfarne’s strategy to develop power infrastructure that supports the proliferation of renewables and the stability of the grid in regions across the Americas with great potential for growth. I am pleased to partner with such high calibre partners as TSK and Rolls-Royce on the delivery of these assets.”

The order to deliver the power plants to the first three locations has been officially placed with the consortium, with the order for the two additional plants scheduled to follow shortly thereafter. The gensets will be digitally connected via gateways sending data to the MTU GoManage platform to monitor and analyse system data. The power plants will be remotely monitored and controlled in real time by Prime Energía’s state of the art Network Operations Center in Santiago.

Chile is one of the fastest growing economic powers in Latin America. Demand for energy is expected to grow at an annual rate of 4 per cent over the next 5 years, and the country expects to benefit from the vast availability of renewable power sources. The percentage of renewable energy in the Chilean power mix is growing at a constant rate: its share, in terms of installed generation capacity, has more than tripled since 2012, and in 2017, with a total plant capacity of around 4,300 MW, was approximately 18 per cent. By 2035, no less than 60 per cent of the country’s electricity is expected to be produced from renewable energy, increasing to 70 per cent by 2050. As Chile increases its reliance on weather variable renewable energy sources, there will be an increased requirement for fast-response, cost-competitive backup power sources such as the power plants in Prime Energía’s portfolio to stabilise the electricity grid.

MTU Onsite Energy gensets installed in South America have a total combined capacity to date of some 2,400 MW, most of which is based on 16V 4000 gensets, including 400 MW in Chile.