In public buildings, 500 kilowat-power photovoltaic plates will be installed and placed on three floors. The installation in addition to the administration will offer energy to companies and families 500 meters away, especially those in vulnerable situations. By the end of 2021, the Balearic Government will build six shared self-consumption facilities.

The plan is part of the Climate Change and Energy Transition Act adopted in February 2019. The aim of the regime is that no more fossil fuels should be used by 2050, and to fulfil its intention, the first step has been to take early this month.

The installations to be built by 2021 will be built in six areas. Four of them will be in Mallorca (in the municipalities of Santa Eugènia, Ses Salines, Deià and Consell), one in Menorca (Ciutadella) and another in Ibiza (in the municipality of Sant Antoni de Partmany). However, if everything goes well, in 2022, they want to launch 30 new PV installations.

For the placement of the plates, contact the municipalities. The installation, to be carried out in the chosen public building, will provide the necessary energy in the day-to-day life of the public administration. In addition, leftover kilowatts will be used to meet the needs of 50 families who suffer “energy poverty” and are in the environment.

In fact, in the Spanish State the price of electricity is not enough to rise: According to operator OMIE, this Sunday, EUR 144.18 per megawatt hour was reached. With the Balearic proposal, the Basque population will reduce this receipt by 70% in daylight hours. Furthermore, since this is an infrastructure managed by the Balearic Energy Institute (IBE), which is under the island government, access charges for electricity use will not apply to users.

The Director-General for Energy and Climate Change elDiario.es, Pep Malagrava, has told EiTB Focus that the measure is a way to deal with the steady increase in energy. However, the director says that his goal is not to compete and “threaten” the multinationals of electricity, but to offer energy to those who cannot have it: “This is the sharing of wealth.”

In addition to the social objective, several members of the government have underlined the project's commitment to climate change and employment in the Basque Country. One of them was the vice-president and advisor for energy transition, productive sectors and democratic memory, Juan Pedro Yllanes: “We are in a climate emergency situation, changes have accelerated and we have less and less time to minimize the effects of climate change.”

According to Yllanes, the effects of the climate emergency on the island will be "very serious" and in order to reach a "turning point" a transition to renewable energies is necessary. To this end, the Vice-President appealed to all actors, “from the administration – the municipalities and the Council – to all SMEs, businesses and productions and economic sectors”.

Investment of the project

The construction of the six new photovoltaic areas to be launched this year will have an investment of EUR 750,000. From this initial funding, EUR 56,000 is expected to be recovered by 2022. They have announced that, in total, it will take five years to recover the money allocated to the project. Subsequently, it is intended to invest in new facilities and projects.

Two other plans

On Friday, Yllanes and Malmore presented at a public hearing the energy aid lines managed by the Balearic Government in Congress. The Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan will invest up to 2026 to boost the energy transition: They will have a budget of more than EUR 41 million, an amount that will be added to EUR 230 million from Huarte Permanente.

The money raised from European aid will be used for three main projects: the democratisation of renewable energies, the reduction of consumption and the improvement of energy efficiency, on the one hand, and the decarbonisation of mobility and the development of the network of charging points, on the other. For the former, around EUR 15 million will be invested; for the latter, more than EUR 100 million; for the latter, EUR 20 million.