Solar-powered irrigation: a new partnership between farming and the Sun
ACCIONA Energía has installed the world’s biggest irrigation system to be powered by a solar plant without batteries in Montesusin (Aragon, Spain).
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Farming is at the same time one of the causes of climate change and one its principal victims. 23% of global CO2 emissions warming the planet come from agricultural activity, which also suffers from growing drought threatening farming’s survival in many regions of the planet.
Developing solutions to break this vicious circle is a key and urgent challenge for the sustainability of the sector that feeds us every day. Such a solution can be found in the pilot project ACCIONA Energía has created in the little village of Montesusin, which promises to prove to be of greater import than its local scope. For it harbors dreams of decarbonizing the farming sector as a whole through the incorporation of renewable energy. It consists of the biggest photovoltaic plant in the world to power an irrigation system, connected directly to the electricity grid and without battery support.
The project consists, in a nutshell, of a 1.58 MWp capacity solar photovoltaic plant directly driving pumps to irrigate farming land throughout the area. Local 100%-renewable, emission-free generation that will also allow farmers to benefit from a stable, highly-competitive electricity tariff over the long term during the irrigation season of May to September. And to obtain, throughout the year, additional revenues by selling the electricity they don’t use back to the grid.
No less important, a modern irrigation system like the one installed at Montesusin also involves more efficient utilization of water, critical in times of drought, and will ensure the best use of every available drop of this so-precious resource.
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A thirsty countryside
With just 200 inhabitants, Montesusin belongs to the municipality of Grañén in the province of Huesca, 34 kilometers south of its capital. The villagers know a lot about the dryness of the land and the life that water brings. The village was formed in 1958, an enclave colonized by the building of the Los Monegros canal, a vital infrastructure bringing water to the thirsty fields of one of the driest districts of Spain.
The cereal crops – corn, barley, wheat and alfalfa - in the area need to be profitable. Alberto Anadón, chairman of the Montesusín Irrigation Association, points to the reduction in electricity bills thanks to the new watering system: “Electricity prices were extremely high, so this project represents very important progress for us, because it allows us to lower costs and pay for electricity at a significantly more economic tariff.”
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Guillermo Peiró, one of the association’s 150 members, signals the effects of making rural life in Spain more attractive to detain the exodus of villagers to cities: “Life in the country is hard and involves a lot of sacrifice. For this reason, it is very important to modernize agriculture through new technologies that make living in the countryside more bearable and young people to want to stay in the village.”
Óscar Dupla, Manager of the Distributed Generation Technical Office at ACCIONA Energy, explained that the electricity generated “drives the pumps whose purpose it is to raise the water from the capture reservoir to the upper pond from which it is then distributed by gravity to all the farming enterprises”.
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Farmers do not now need to worry about what time of day or night is more economic for watering.
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Business and innovation model
Another virtue of the solution proposed by ACCIONA Energía is the business model underpinning the initiative. Cristina Morante, the company’s Head of Distribution Generation, emphasized: “The commercial agreement that we offer is highly advantageous for the irrigation community, as they neither need to assume an investment cost for the plant, nor for operation and maintenance throughout its lifetime, nor worry about energy security. All these services feature within the long-term contract price, which is much less than the price they were paying for electricity before the installation of the system.Farmers can thus be sure that they can water their crops at a stable price without fear of electricity market uncertainty.”
Project innovation is not limited to the area of commercial management either; it also incorporates a technological dimension as a result of the close collaboration between ACCIONA Energía and Madrid Polytechnic University (UPM) within a project included in the line of aid for Low Carbon Economy projects, in Electric Power Generation Installations with Renewable Energy Sources, co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and managed by the IDAE, with the aim of achieving a cleaner and more sustainable economy.
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Professor Luis Narvarte, coordinator of the European project, explained: “This new technology resolves the problems derived from the photovoltaic intermittency without need for batteries, which will allow the irrigators to receive electricity for their pumping stations at a much more competitive price than before. With Montesusin, which constitutes the biggest system currently operating with this technology, we are closing the cycle from an R&D line to the first prototypes and their introduction into the market.”
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TECHNICAL DESCRIPTION OF THE MONTESUSIN SOLAR-POWERED IRRIGATION PLANT
- Project: irrigation system for dry farming powered by photovoltaic energy on a self-use basis.
- Plant capacity: 1.58 Megawatt peak (MWp) Plant area: 35.585 m2
- No. of solar modules: 2.400 with 660 W.
- Plant technology: polycrystalline silicon photovoltaic with solar tracking
- Forecast average generation: 3,000 MWh/year (TBC by business).
- Emissions avoided: 1,300 tonnes of CO2/year (based on an average generation of 3,000 MWh/year)
- Commercial regime: long-term PPA contract (26 years) for which ACCIONA will assume the investment, operation and maintenance costs in exchange for a fixed electricity supply price.
- No. of farmers affected: 150
- Affected irrigation area: 3,400 ha.
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Extension to other farmers
ACCIONA Energía wants to demonstrate its experience at Montesusin can be extended to other irrigation communities. Based on the same strategy, it has put forward a project called “Photovoltaic Pumping Innovation for Irrigation Communities” which has a subsidy of EUR 4.35 million from the European Climate, Infrastructure and Environment Executive Agency (CINEA) of the European Commission.
The project plans to install smart irrigation systems powered by photovoltaic energy for around 2,000 farmers in the Ebro basin with the intention of extending it to irrigators in other river basins. It presently foresees the installation of a total photovoltaic capacity of 7.35 MWp with an estimated production of some 12,000 MWh per year, which will avoid the annual emission of 1,800 tonnes of CO2 through renewable energy generation.
It involves a total investment of around EUR 7.5 million and is led by ACCIONA Energía with the participation of UPM, the National Federation of Irrigation Associations, Cingral (a rural and agro-food engineering consultancy), Qualifying Photovoltaics (QPV), and the Upper Aragon Irrigation Associations.
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