Uruguayan wind power takes top spot in March generation figures

For the first time ever in Uruguay, wind power has surpassed hydro in contributing power to the national grid.

During March, wind energy became the principal source of power generation in the country, displacing hydro to second place. Wind power contributed 40.55% of generation in March compared to hydro's 38.35%, according to figures published on state power company UTE's website.

Biomass (8.92%), thermoelectric (7.58%), solar power(4.61%) and imports contributed the remaining power.

UTE's generation manager Daniel Larrosa told local newspaper El Pais that the results were due to the incorporation of new wind farms over the past year. In 2017, Larrosa said, 310MW was added onto the existing 1.5GW of wind power generation the country already had in operation. The opening of these new parks "is going to be noticed all through this year," Larrosa added.

Generation nationwide was much lower in March 2018 (281MWh) than the same month in 2017 (127GWh), a period in which Uruguay raised hydro and thermoelectric generation to export an increased amount of power to Brazil, whose hydro-dominant power matrix was suffering from a widespread drought.

Power generation in Uruguay. Source: UTE