No Solution to the Electricity Crisis Without Renewable Energy
The electric power sector and the issue of securing a sustainable supply remain mired in crises, after the National Plan for the Sustainable Recovery of the Electricity Sector, approved by the caretaker government in March 2022, ran into the conflicting priorities and interests of the ruling factions. Indeed, having once been one of the main causes of Lebanon's financial and economic crisis, the electricity crisis has become one of its manifestations, at a time when the Lebanese had hoped that putting the electricity crisis on the path to resolution would pave the way for resolving the remaining crises afflicting the country.
It is worth noting that the development of the electric power sector has previously faced numerous setbacks and attempts at obstruction since rehabilitation projects were launched after the Lebanese war came to an end in the early 1990s. The electric power sector turned from a strategic utility, providing a financial surplus for the state and operational power for all economic sectors, into an arena for settling political scores and sterile polemics among the ruling factions. It is as if the damage and losses inflicted on this sector by repeated Israeli attacks, which struck it directly both during and after the rehabilitation works, were not enough.
It was astonishing that the threat of a halt in supply returned once again, less than three years after implementation of the recovery plan began and for the very same reason that brought it to a halt in September 2021. This raises questions, on the one hand, about the reasons preventing Electricité du Liban from maintaining a reserve stock and acting to meet the needs of production plants before supplies run out, and, on the other hand, about the need to rationalise inventory management by controlling the number of supply hours in order to extend the duration of production and prevent it from stopping.
While Electricité du Liban attributes the renewed electricity crisis to Banque du Liban's refusal to convert the funds available in its account from pounds into dollars to settle dues owed to the Iraqi government, Banque du Liban attributes it to the fact that the utility's balance at the bank is insufficient to cover the amount it is requesting, and that there is no legal provision allowing the Ministry of Energy to borrow from Banque du Liban to make the required financial transfers. What matters to the consumer, however, is obtaining electricity, whereas procedures and measures are the responsibility of the government.
The latest crisis underscores the need to adopt new approaches to addressing the electricity crisis that are not limited to securing sufficient funding to purchase the fuel needed by production plants. This is especially true given that the Ministry of Energy and Water remained obsessed with building thermal plants until February of last year, when the minister proposed building three new ones at a time when he is unable to secure the fuel to operate the existing plants. The approach required today must rely on alternative energy to lift the electricity file out of crisis and achieve a regular, not to say sustainable, supply.
The sharp decline in the prices of solar panels and their accessories must serve as an incentive for those in charge of the electricity file to move toward harnessing solar energy in any future plan. Notably, many Lebanese did not wait for prices to fall to set up their own production units, to the point that the volume of electricity currently generated by solar power stations approaches 1,500 megawatts.
Moreover, the cost of generating electricity from solar power plants has been declining markedly since the past decade, according to a 2020 report by the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA), recording an 85% drop in the period between 2010 and 2020. As for the prices of batteries, which are essential for balancing the current generated from solar energy, they in turn saw a similar decline between 2008 and 2020.
Projections indicate that the cost of solar energy production will continue to fall by 60% in the period from 2024 to 2050. This makes solar energy and its storage units the most suitable option for generating electricity by 2030, and renders the cost of investing in it 50% lower compared with the cost of building a coal-fired plant of the same size. In a 2022 report, the International Energy Agency (IEA) confirmed that renewable energy would replace coal as the largest source of electricity generation by 2025.
Solar power plants are characterised by the short period required to build them, not exceeding one year compared with three years to build wind power plants, for example. This allows investors in solar power plants to begin recouping some of their costs while other alternative energy plants are still under construction. Perhaps this explains the rush by the 11 Lebanese companies to obtain licences to establish solar power plants with a capacity not exceeding 10 megawatts each.
Advocating reliance on solar energy in the new approach does not negate the need for the new approach to include all the other renewable energy sources that Lebanon enjoys, particularly wind power and organic waste with the energy it stores. All the more so since waste in turn remains an intractable crisis, making the generation of electricity from waste treatment a simultaneous solution to the chronic waste and electricity crises.
Conversely, despite the importance of the Ministry of Energy and Water encouraging investments in alternative energy in general and solar energy in particular, it must at the same time prevent attempts to monopolise solar power plants by both local and foreign companies. Fears of a monopoly by foreign companies are growing following the interest shown by CMA CGM and the consortium of the two companies TotalEnergies and QatarEnergy, and talk of their acquiring more than one of the 11 licences.
The role of those in charge of the energy file in Lebanon must not be limited to granting licences and encouraging the adoption of solar energy and investment in it; rather, work must be done to establish solar power stations alongside thermal and hydroelectric plants. If there are to be sustainable solutions to the electricity crisis, they will neither be available nor possible without recourse to alternative energy, particularly solar energy; indeed, the state must be a key partner in these solutions.
Translated from Arabic with AI. Read it in Arabic