New law benefits renewables in Brazil

Brazil's President Dilma Rousseff signed on Wednesday the 13,203 law, changing a number of measures in the local electricity sector and adding some benefits for renewables.

Among the highlights of the new law for the Brazilian renewable energy sector are the capacity of the generating companies to protect themselves against new droughts with the permission to buy and stock renewable energy, in a similar fashion to the reserve energy auctions.

The Brazilian Development Bank, or BNDES, is now authorised to finance with smaller rates renewable energy and energy efficiency projects in hospitals and public schools. For generators of solar, wind, biomass and cogeneration power, the government now provides discounts of 50% in transmission and distribution tariffs. The law also gives discounts on the usage fee for new plants focused on auto generation renewable systems and facilitates the reorganisation of the shareholding of special purpose entities to drive investments in new power plants.

In addition to benefiting the renewables sector, the new law seeks to resolve the Brazilian hydrological risk and create a new subsidy model to increase the attractiveness of investments.

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