Chile's Ministry of Energy obtained USD $50 millions to develop PV projects

The Chilean Ministry of Energy announced in a statement published on may, 6th that it had obtained funding to develop photovoltaic projects (PV) for USD $ 50 million from the Clean Technology Fund (CTF). The financial support will be provided by the Inter-American Development Bank (IADB) as soft loans for investors.

The Deputy Secretary of Energy, Sergio del Campo, explained that "this financing obtained by the Ministry of Energy inWashington, is a clear demonstration of the political will of the Government to incorporate renewable energy to the Chilean energy matrix".

The idea is to use this resources to develop solar projects  that will be connected to one of Chile’s main grid systems, either Big North Interconnected System (SING) or Central Interconnected System (SIC).

Del Campo said is importante to add to this initiative "the international tender made ​​by the Government since last February, which includes funds for USD $ 390 million to develop a project of Concentrated Solar Power, the first in Latin America with this technology".

The country's current installed photovoltaic capacity is 3.6 MW. At present time, there are several projects under construction amounting to 68.3 MW. In addition, over 4 GW are in planning, according to April’s statistics released by the Renewable Energy Center.