Enel's Endesa eyes replacing Spain's biggest coal plant with gigascale wind

The largest coal-fired power plant in Spain will be closed down, with plans by its owner Endesa to replace it with 1.3GW of wind power.

Endesa, a unit of Italian renewables giant Enel, announced on Friday that it had been given the “green light” by the Spanish government to shut down the 1.4GW As Pontes plant.

The plant, which opened in 1976 and is based in Spain’s northern Galicia region, boasts four 350MW coal-fired units.

Two of these had already been shuttered but the government stalled on allowing the others to be closed amid what is described as “great tension” in energy supply markets caused by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

However, the Ministry for Ecological Transition said that a new report by the Spanish grid had confirmed that the closure of the rest of the plant was compatible with the “security” of Spain’s energy supply.

Endesa plans to replace the coal plant with 1.3GW of wind projects that will cost around €2.7bn ($2.9bn).

This plan is still awaiting government permits and internal authorisations by Endesa. The utility does however say it has already been granted 650MW of grid connection.

Endesa says the energy produced by the wind farms would support new industrial developments on the land previously used by the plant. This would include a factory that would be built and operated by Chinese tyre manufacturer Sentury Tire.

Endesa would meanwhile develop a centre for wind turbine maintenance and logistics on the old plant site. It also has plans for a green hydrogen generation facility, supported with an up to 100MW electrolyser.

If it gets the go-ahead, the utility estimates it will create almost 1,400 jobs.

In a statement, Endesa said it is continuing to "make progress” in meeting its goals to decarbonise and transition to green energy.

Carlota Ruiz of the International Institute for Law and the Environment said that, “with the closure of As Pontes, we can now concretely say that coal is no longer required for Spain’s energy security.”

“Spain should now be aiming to produce all of its power from renewables by 2035,” she said. “That means adopting the same no-nonsense approach to fossil gas as it has done with coal.”