New deal expands Total’s presence in Spain’s solar market –

Global energy company Total has expanded its presence in the Spanish solar energy market by signing a new deal with renewable energy developer Ignitis.

Ignitis and Total will develop 3.3GW of solar energy projects in Madrid and Andalusia.

The first projects are scheduled to start in 2022, with the ambition of bringing them all into production by 2025.

The deal follows Total signing two agreements with Powertis and Solarbay Renewable Energy in February 2020 for the development of nearly 2GW of solar projects.

The new deal expands Total’s portfolio of solar projects in Spain to more than 5GW by 2025.

This means Total is becoming a major player in the country’s energy transition, contributing to Spain’s ambition to generate 70% of its electricity from renewables by 2030 and 100% by mid-century.

This solar power portfolio will enable Total to cover all the electricity consumption of its industrial sites in Europe by 2025. To do this, the Group will purchase nearly 6TWh per year of green electricity generated by its Spanish solar sites through a power purchase agreement covering more than 3GW of solar farms.

This will be the largest corporate PPA in the world.

Patrick Pouyanné, CEO of Total, said: “Total is becoming one of the main broad-energy players in the country by intervening both in the production of renewable and gas-based electricity and in the distribution of gas and electricity. Our ambition, first and foremost, is to provide a clean, affordable electricity offering to our residential customers in Spain. Spain is a priority country for Total in Europe and we fully intend to leverage the market’s growth opportunities that the country offers to respond concretely to the challenges of the energy transition towards carbon neutrality.

“This decision to invest massively in renewable electricity capacity to supply all our industrial operations in Europe with green energy is concrete proof of our decision to move towards decarbonizing our European operations in line with our new climate ambition. It also demonstrates the value of integrating production, trading and sales in the electricity chain.”