Solar Plant

Today, we visited CPFL, the main electric energy generation group in Brasil. CPFL is a clean energy provider with 4 utility companies and 8 distribution companies. First, we went to one of their utilities companies in Campinas, right outside of the city of Sao Paulo. There were two tour guides that showed us the company and answered any questions that we would have. They took us to the control room. In this room, the engineers monitor the levels of energy supplied 24/7 in case that any power outages may happen, and then communicate with the maintenance department to fix any issues as soon as possible. There are also agents responsible of providing customer services to the different customers.

We then went into the Smart Meter Intelligence room. Smart Metering measures the energy being used by the users for billing purposes, but also, it can control how much energy is being used.

Our guides showed us the electric cars the company is working on. Although they predict that soon, the amount of electric cars in Brasil will reach 1.5%, right now it is very low. There are only 11 charging stations in the whole state of Sao Paulo. Currently, they are monitoring 50 cars to get the necessary info for their research on making it cost effective. Their cars can only go for 120km and they cannot go very fast. Electric cars still have a long way to go in Brasil.

We then went on to Tanquinho, the main solar energy farm. We got the opportunity to see solar panels and the operation room for the plant with all the invertors and converters to turn energy from AC to DC. Some of their solar panels move rotate with the sun, which makes them 11% more efficient than normal solar panels. In general, their solar panels have an efficiency between 9 and 14 percent. This reflects the room for growth that the country still has for alternative energy, since currently solar panels in other countries have an efficiency between 20 and 24 percent.

                                   

At the end we got the opportunity to drive the electric car. The whole trip was a wonderful experience. In some occasions, it was challenging to understand all the concepts and explanations because I am not familiar with alternative energy and there were some language barriers. Our guides, who are employees at the company are not native English speakers and neither am I, so it was hard for them to translate the terms they use every day into a foreign language and then it was difficult for me to understand those terms in a different language. However, other members in our group were nice and patient enough to answer some of the questions I still had and help me understand better. Overall, I really enjoyed the trip, I'm very excited about the next trips and it will be very helpful in my future since I plan on getting more involved with alternative energy in the future and work in the business sector of the clean energy industry.