international
December 2022 - With support from the U.S. State Department, Bureau of Energy Resources, Power Sector Program (ENR/PSP), NARUC has engaged in a regional partnership with national energy regulators from Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Panama as well as the regional grid operator (Ente Operador Regional) and regional regulator (Comisión Regional de Interconexión Eléctrica) in Central America since 2018. This partnership promotes regional electricity integration and clean energy deployment through building understanding and consensus on cross-cutting issues, with a focus on promoting regulatory frameworks to incentivize clean energy. NARUC’s assistance is designed to support opening electricity markets and reduce barriers to power trade and development by strengthening regulatory frameworks in the region to improve governance and transparency in the power sector.
Distributed generation (DG) will play an important role in increasing grid reliability and energy security through the use of geographically dispersed, smaller scale renewable energy resources. With that in mind, this report provides a high-level overview of the current objectives, challenges, and considered solutions related to the development of DG in the national and regional contexts of the five Central American countries that take part in the ENR-NARUC Central America Regulatory Partnership. It also outlines high-level regional priorities in further promoting DG in Central America and the relevant DG experience of U.S. regulators. Using this information, readers can learn about how to best harmonize regulatory approaches to DG development with a focus on facilitating renewable energy integration and improving the resiliency of national and regional grids.
Click here to access the report. A Spanish translation is also available here.