The financial competitiveness of photovoltaic installations in water utilities: The case of the Tagus-Segura water transfer system

Abstract

The Tagus-Segura water transfer is a large infrastructure that allows the distribution of a large amount of water resources, which is associated with a significant energy cost. Therefore, energy improvements are a fundamental tool to reduce one of the main financial costs of the infrastructure, as well as the emission of greenhouse gases. For this reason, the feasibility of self-consumption through photovoltaic solar panels has been analysed, which requires a significant initial investment, but can be recovered over the lifetime of the panels due to the savings obtained yearly. The incorporation into the article of a sensitivity analysis of the price of energy and the amount of energy produced makes the analysis robust, as it can be seen that, although there is vulnerability with respect to variations in these variables, the risk of losses is low.