FISP Climat: Combined solar greenhouse and solar panel in Dominican Republic electricity power station and pumping centre (ICARE)

The Dominican Republic is a large country of almost 50,000 km², with a population of 10 million inhabitants. In the midst of a great deal of development, this island is experiencing increasing energy demands that the three local electricity companies are having difficulties meeting.

This project is located in the north-west of the Dominican Republic, just 3 km from the border with Haiti. The lack of electricity generation units on this part of the island forces EDENORTE, which manages the electricity grid here, to provide electricity to half the population in the morning, and to the other half in the afternoon. The rest of the time people have to use their own generators for their electricity needs.
 

The innovation represented by the ICARE project comes at various different levels:

• This project is one of the first industrial-scale solar projects in the country. It is provide the electricity grid management with the elements necessary to operate this means of productions.
• The net invoicing programme implemented represents a new approach for the Dominican government. This project acts as a large-scale example, paving the way for the installation of other similar projects and demonstrating the feasibility of powering a large part (55%) of the plant independently of the electricity grid.
• Not all growing is suitable or conducive to this type of production tool. Experience gained by Akuo through its photovoltaic greenhouse projects in La Reunion is enable it to find the most appropriate solutions for the Dominican Republic.
• The implementation of this technology in a deprived region is provide a partial response to the deficit in electricity generation in the area.

This project also comes as a brave integration of innovative technology in an environment still in development, with backing from a major banking body.

It represents a way of reassuring the banking partnership over the risk linked to the territory, thereby enabling further electricity generation projects using renewable sources to be developed in this country, which has everything still to do in renewables. At the same time, it can act as a shop window for the Caribbean and Latin America for photovoltaic greenhouse agriculture and for the feasibility of self-sufficiency within industrial farming.

• The project is set to have a broadly positive impact on its environment.
  Electricity production from 100% renewable resources is enable current plant CO2 emissions to be greatly reduced.
  At the same time, the installation of photovoltaic greenhouses is enable the company to gain a fixed structure for the development of its banana plants. With a setting up period of just months, the impact of assembling and removing temporary greenhouses is removed, and the growing tool remain available to plantation workers for the rest of the year.
   
• Local wealth creation.
  The material supplies for the installation is mainly come from inside the country, and training will be provided to give people skills in construction, operation and maintenance, with new jobs being created in the region.