Power plants in Gilan Province generated ten million megawatt hours of electricity in 2020 of which only 500,000 MW hours was from renewables, head of the marketing office of the provincial power company said.
“There are 12 power stations in this region, five of which (Talesh, Bijar, Tarik, Sefidroud and Loshan) are hydroelectric and a wind power plant is in Manjil, 250 kilometers north of Tehran,” Mohsen Babazadeh was quoted as saying by the Energy Ministry news portal.
Of the total production six million MWh was consumed in the province and the balance was supplied to Mazandaran, Ardebil, Zanjan and Qazvin.
In addition to the two combined-cycle plants (Paresar in Rezvanshahr County and Gilan in Rasht), three are two small-scale power plants with distributed generation systems (Gil and Caspian) and a combined heat and power (CHP) plant in Bandar Anzali Free Trade Zone.
"Manjil wind power plant with 71 turbines produced close to 100,000 megawatt hours of electricity in the 12 months.”
Efficient harnessing of wind energy will help reduce dependence on fossil fuel as it cuts electricity generation from thermal power plants using natural gas and other fossil fuels (mazut).
Furthermore, wind energy does not produce waste or contaminate water – a major issue given the water crisis in the country. Unlike fossil fuels and nuclear power plants, wind energy has one of the lowest water-consumption footprints, which makes it instrumental in conserving water that is reducing rapidly in Iran.
Shifting to renewables is becoming a norm in most countries (including oil-rich states) as they struggle with massive ecological problems, namely global warming from fossil fuels.
Despite the growing global opposition to thermal in Iran the authorities still insist on constructing more thermal power plants and raising their efficiency from 20% to 30% with little focus on boosting green energy.
Wind energy is produced in 79 countries; 24 of them have more than 1,000 MW installed capacity each. In terms of megawatt accumulation, the five main markets are China, the US, Germany, Spain and India.
Iran's installed power capacity is 85 gigawatts of which less than 1 GW comes from renewables such as hydropower, solar and wind.
Gilan lies along the Caspian Sea in north Iran. It gets the highest annual rainfall in Iran -- 4.5 times above national and 1.2 times above global average. This has helped the growth of lush greenery and dense forests that give the province a unique status and biodiversity.
