The Minister of Energy and Mines Antonio Goncalves explained that the additional contracted energy will be supplied by the Quevedo and Salitral plants and a floating power plant, south of Guayaquil that arrived in the country this Sunday.
Goncalves pointed out that contracting the power plant is part of the actions undertaken to counteract the electrical emergency declared on April 16th.
However, local media speculate that the 250 MW contracted by the Executive will not be enough to face the energy generation deficit, which will worsen in the last months of the year, taking into account that there is a 1,080 MW deficit, according to the National Electricity Operator.
The Turkish vessel hired by the Ecuadorian authorities will provide up to 110 megawatts of electricity to deal with the next dry season.
The hiring of the barge generated questions based on the fact that the plant was assembled in just one month, since it was initially a cargo ship, but above all because it set sail for Ecuador long before the Executive launched the tender for the service.
The president of the College of Electrical Engineers of the province of Azuay, Diego Morales, considers that the floating power plant is a “patch solution” to the situation in the country, which experienced blackouts in April of this year for up to 13 hours in some places.
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