According to foreign media reports, Portuguese utility company Endesa Generación Portugal has received approval to develop a renewable energy project that combines solar power generation facilities, wind power generation facilities, green hydrogen energy facilities and a 168.6MW battery energy storage system. to replace Portugal's last coal-fired power plant.

Endesa will deploy 365MW of solar power generation facilities, 264MW of wind power generation facilities, 168.6MW of battery energy storage systems, and a 500kW electrolyzer for the production of green hydrogen.

The project will require a total investment of 600 million euros ($660 million). Investments in the project will not be affected by external financial assistance as it is economically sustainable, Endesa said in a press release.

The battery energy storage system in this project will reduce energy losses and optimize its use in a dynamic and optimized manner, and export the stored renewable energy power to the public service grid (RESP).

The green hydrogen electrolyzer will use excess electricity from renewable energy generation facilities. Portugal's Deputy Energy Minister, João Galamba, presented the exact rationale for deploying green hydrogen facilities at the Energy Storage Summit organized by Solar Media.

However, the scale of the 500kW green hydrogen electrolyzer is relatively small compared to other renewable power generation + energy storage developments, such as the Horizeo project in France, where a 10MW green hydrogen electrolyzer is deployed.

The 628MW Pego coal-fired power plant, the last operating coal-fired power plant in Portugal, ceased production last November, marking the end of Portugal's coal-fired era. Endesa said it has developed a training program for more than 2,000 employees at the plant. The plant is managed by a joint venture between Endesa and Trustenergy, a joint venture between energy giant Engie and Japanese conglomerate Marubeni.

Enel Green Power, the renewable energy subsidiary of Enel, has been developing the Spanish market in recent years, deploying vanadium redox flow battery energy systems and iron flow battery energy storage systems for customers.

Portugal is one of the few countries in Europe to adopt large-scale pumped-storage power generation facilities, and an 880MW pumped-storage power generation facility under construction in the north of the country will be fully operational by mid-2022.