Enel: production starts on Cristalandia wind farm in Brazil

Rome - Through its Brazilian renewable subsidiary, Enel Green Power Brasil Participacoes ("Egpb"), has started production on its Cristalandia wind farm, which has a total installed capacity of 90 MW. The communication was made in a statement from the company. The plant is located in the towns of Brumado, Rio de Contas and Dom Basilio, in Brazil's north-eastern state of Bahia. "We are extremely pleased to announce that Enel has launched another renewable plant awarded to them as part of a public tender - confirms Carlo Zorzoli, Enel's country manager in Brazil - in Bahia, where the Cristalandia wind farm is located; we handle as much as 1.3 GW of renewable capacity both in operations and construction, making the most of the vast resources found in the State.

Throughout Brazil we are committed to supporting the country's economy as responsibly as possible, contributing to its diversification in the renewable energy mix and by launching support initiatives with a view to creating shared values for the local communities." The Group has invested around 190 million US dollars in the construction of Cristalandia, awarded to Egpb in the Leilao de Fontes Alternativas (Lfa) public tender for renewable energy in April 2015.

The wind farm is backed by a twenty-year supply agreement, with a group of Brazilian electricity distribution companies, and is capable of generating around 350 GWh in a year, the equivalent annual energy consumption of more than 170 thousand Brazilian families, thus preventing the release of around 118 thousand tons of CO2 into the atmosphere. In line with the "Creating Shared Value, CSV" model adopted by the Group, which aims to combine business development with local community needs, he explains in a note, Egpb has advanced a series of Csv initiatives in the areas around the plant, like creative recycling workshops with the local communities, to boost earnings through the re-use of construction material from the plant, like pallets transformed into pieces of furniture and canvases used to create artifacts to sell at local markets. In the state of Bahia, Enel Group's subsidiary, Egpb, currently handles a total of 711 MW of solar and wind capacity and is building a further 600 MW in projects that use these two renewable sources.