The development of renewable energy can immensely curtail annual natural gas consumption in thermal power plants, Iran Renewable Energy Association’s (IrREA) secretary-general said.
“Close to 71 billion cubic meters of gas are burnt in power stations in Iran each year to generate around 300 billion kilowatt hours of electricity. This is while a small investment in renewables can help reduce gas consumption substantially,” ILNA also quoted Mohammad Amin Zanganeh as saying.
Supplying as little as 20% of total annual power demand with the help of green energy resources, namely solar and wind that does not require huge investments, can curb annual gas consumption in power plants by as much as 14 bcm, which equals the annual production of one phase of South Pars Gas Field, he added.
Replacing low efficiency power stations, which account for 20% of Iran’s total electricity supply, with new facilities is necessary, but most likely they will face feedstock problems in the future as natural gas resources are limited. Hence, the construction of solar and wind farms is the most feasible alternative to ensure energy security.
Coal-fired power plants are not recommended due to their adverse environmental impacts, nor are nuclear facilities suggested because they require colossal investment.
“As long as fossil fuels, such as natural gas, are heavily subsidized in Iran, clean energy will not get the space it deserves. Inexpensive natural gas has encouraged officials to keep building thermal power stations and neglect renewables,” he said.
Zanganeh said the government lacks a roadmap for energy economics, noting, however, that efforts have been made to replace fossil fuels with green energy.
Such attempts “have never been taken seriously” due largely to the bloated policymaking bureaucracy and shortsightedness of decision-makers, he added.
Another major problem is that power export is monopolized in Iran and the administration has never allowed private power producers to enter this realm.
Global Prices
According to Zanganeh, global prices for solar PV power have been falling over the past 10 years.
“The manufacture of a solar panel cost $2.5 in 2010, which today is less than 50 cents,” he added.
Renewables are rivaling fossil fuels, including coal, which once was termed “king coal” and was one of the cheapest sources of energy.
Subsidy policy is generally designed to help the low-income strata like fixed-wage earners, but in practice it benefits the rich simply because they consume more energy, which often is the criticism of poverty-alleviation experts in Tehran.
Regarding Iran’s potential for renewable energy, Zanganeh said when solar power stations are fully developed, they can help meet 35% of the domestic electricity demand, which is now around 75 gigawatts.
“Our oil-dependent economy has never let us appreciate the value of green energy and so this sector is not dynamic in Iran,” he said, complaining that subsidies may be a necessary evil, but are harmful in the long run, especially from the perspective of sustainable economic development.
IrREA is the only independent non-governmental syndicate in Iran focused on green energy. The association's activities include promoting and institutionalizing the use of clean energy, namely wind, solar, biomass, geothermal and hydrogen energy, as well as interacting with major companies, institutions, experts and stakeholders in the renewable energy sector.
Dirty Fuel
Many countries in the developing and developed world are gradually moving away from dirty fuel toward cleaner energy.
Some rich nations have raised the bar higher and declared that in the next few years, renewables and electric vehicles will be the norm while fossil fuels will be consigned to history.
According to Mohammad-Ali Pour-Amiri, a member of the Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency Organization, the production of each megawatt of electricity at thermal power plants needs about 700 liters of water while renewable power stations do not use water and, as a result, prevent the consumption of over 1.5 billion liters of water annually.
“Considering the large number of thermal power plants in the central and arid regions of Iran, which use huge amounts of freshwater, the development of renewable power stations and replacement of a part of thermal stations could have saved up to 17 billion liters of water per year.
According to the latest reports, the capacity of renewable power plants in the country is 990 megawatts, the main share of which comes from solar power stations (52%) and then wind farms (34%).
“Renewable power plants in the country generate 2.2 billion kilowatt hours of electricity per year. If the same amount of electricity was to be produced by thermal power plants, it would need $300 million worth of fossil fuel as feedstock,” he said.
“When and if the capacity of renewables in Iran reaches 5,000 MW, the country can save $3.3 billion annually by not burning fossil fuels, which could then be exported or used to produce other value-added products.”
