Just a few days ago, the citizens of the Canary Islands expressed their will regarding oil exploration in our waters. Whatever the conservatives in the Government of Spain may say, the 200,000 citizens who expressed their opinion in the streets show us that the majority of Canarian society says no to oil and yes to renewable energies.
All problems contain opportunities within them. We have before us a challenge that carries with it an enormous opportunity: a) the problem of polluting our seas and beaches, and being slaves to a dirty and outdated technology; and b) the opportunity for the Canary Islands to become an international model of innovation in renewable energies, inexhaustible, job-creating, generating benefits for the people and the environment, and highly independent of oil prices.
Once the people of the Canary Islands have said they don't want oil, we, the public representatives, have the great responsibility to launch a new economic model based on renewable energies in our land. We have to establish without pause a roadmap that allows us to transform the generation and management of energy in the Canary Islands from the current mode to a clean energy model. To do this, we must carry out actions and resolve difficulties in different areas:
1. Technological. These are interesting and manageable challenges. Basically, we have the technologies and successful experiences that demonstrate that it is possible to do it on a large scale.
2. Financial. These are solvable problems since our own internal market provides them with profitability as long as the legislation of the electricity sector is not designed to leave them out of profitability.
3. Regulatory. Obtaining licenses, environmental authorizations, and territorial authorizations are the main obstacles to the implementation of renewables in our islands; they are the most complicated difficulties we face, so we will have to allocate most of the human resources and efforts that are made in the field of energy to solve them. It is important to recognize that the lack of agile and effective environmental and territorial regulations in the Canary Islands has prevented the implementation of renewables.
People have not only said NO to oil. They have said YES to RENEWABLES. Therefore, now the development of these energies is not an optional decision. At this moment it is a mandate from the population to the Government.
We have enormous opportunities in the Canary Islands if we change to an energy model based on renewables. As an example, the CO2 derived from the exhaust gases of energy generation in the Canary Islands would allow obtaining fuel for 70% of the demand of the archipelago's automotive fleet. We can build an Energy System with a zero carbon balance based on the capture of CO2 from the atmosphere by means of algae and agricultural crops; the production of biodiesel and electricity from these crops; the use of CO2 from the exhaust gas of electricity generation to combine it with H2 from renewable energies; and the obtaining of CH4 to move gasoline cars.
Everything has already been carried out in the German city of Wertle by a well-known European automotive brand, obtaining the biofuel at a price of €1.14/l.
The cited process is exposed in the following scheme:
The use of CO2 from the exhaust gases of the Canary Islands power plants to obtain gasoline substitute biofuel (compressed CH4) can be carried out by combining it with Hydrogen from renewable sources using a methanation reaction. In this way, the 3.4 million tons of CO2 that are emitted in the Canary Islands for electricity generation would allow obtaining 1.2 million tons of biofuel, capable of supplying the demand of 70% of the islands' mobile fleet (830,000 vehicles out of a total of 1,200,000). This is money for the Canarian economy, environmental care, knowledge economy and employment.
Javier Morales, CC-AHI deputy in the Parliament of the Canary Islands.