- The company has planned nearly 1,300 projects throughout the region that will make the electricity grid smarter and more digital, improve customer service and enable the deployment of renewable energies.
- One of the main axes of action of the triennium 2023-2025 focuses on the digitalisation of infrastructures, which will become the main facilitators of the decarbonisation process.
- The new Investment Plan places special emphasis on low voltage, with the allocation of approximately 189.3 million euros.
- The actions will generate more than 2,900 additional jobs in the region.
Between 2023-2025, Endesa will invest around 994 million euros to make Catalonia's electricity grid smarter and more digital, to continue improving the quality of the service received by the company's 4.4 million customers in the region (customers with a contract for access to energy infrastructures), but, above all, to facilitate the energy transition and deploy renewable energies. The investments, worked together and approved by the Generalitat of Catalonia, are in addition to the 263.7 million euros that Endesa is already allocating this year to the distribution grid within the framework of the current triennium (2021-23).
Through its distribution subsidiary, e-distribución, Endesa plans to carry out nearly 1,300 projects throughout Catalonia, aimed at improving the digitalisation, reliability, resilience, flexibility and efficiency of Endesa's extensive distribution grid in Catalonia, which represents 39% of company's capacity in the region. In Catalonia, Endesa has 45,669 transformation centres, 208 substations, 126 distribution centres and 98,910 kilometres of power lines (low, medium and high voltage) distributed among the four areas.
The actions will focus mainly on any axes that make it possible to continue digitising the grid, guarantee its robustness and resilience, facilitating access to renewables, improving the quality and continuity of supply – minimising service disruptions as far as possible – and preparing the infrastructures for the increase in demand as a result of electrification (expected to increase by about 7,500 MWh within three years).
This was planned after listening to and prioritising the region's most immediate requirements, while being aware of the crucial role played by the distribution grid on individual quality of life, since it allows electricity to reach homes, industries and services, connecting transport networks and generation plants with consumption points.
Specifically, Endesa plans to act directly on more than 11,100 kilometres of high, medium and low voltage lines, with a particular focus on the investment effort in low voltage, which stands at almost 189.3 million euros. The company foresees improvements in more than 4,700 kilometres of low-voltage cables between 2023 and 2025.
Executing these actions is expected to generate more than 2,900 jobs, direct and indirect, at a rate of about 960 jobs per year.
Digitalisation: cross-cutting and forward-looking focus
The transformation of distribution grids plays a key role in ensuring the integration of renewable energies, the development of technologies that facilitate distributed energy and the massive deployment of the electric vehicle. The distribution grid as we know it will mutate into active and participatory grids, in which the customer will be the centre of the electricity system and service quality will be improved. That is why Endesa places digitalisation as the central axis of all this change, since electricity infrastructures will become the real facilitators of the energy transition process in which it is already immersed.
Apart from achieving decarbonisation and electrification of the economy, the electricity grid also faces a major challenge: resilience. Research in innovation and the application of new technologies is key to be prepared for when extreme weather events start affecting the quality of supply, one of the consequences of climate change.
As an example, one of the tools provided by digitalisation to improve and reinforce supply quality is the grid automation process and the installation of remote controls, to reduce the time to restore the electrical service in case of an incident, by making it possible to perform remote actions to carry out the first operations and thus shorten the supply restoration period by up to 20%.
In the period 2023-2025, Endesa plans to install nearly 15,000 remote controls throughout Catalonia, to exceed 33,000 within three years and continue the deployment launched in recent years. In addition, new line switches will be installed and act automatically in the event of incidents in the grid, in order to isolate the damaged sections and restore the supply in the shortest possible time.
Another key element in this transformation is the sensorisation of the transformation centres, which consists of monitoring the status of transformers and low-voltage grids, so as to observe and analyse the performance of parameters such as voltages and temperatures in order to control their correct operation and achieve preventive and predictive digital management of these assets. First deployed in 2018, this initiative has been in gradual crescendo. During the next triennium, Endesa plans to install around 27,800 across Catalonia, to reach approximately 50,200 by 2025.
Digitalisation, therefore, extends throughout the entire infrastructure of the distribution grid, from its systems and processes to the customer service channels. By using it, the focus is on improving the quality of supply to customers, so that supply disruptions and incident response times are reduced, whether they are their own or derived from external agents.
It also leverages the potential of big data and artificial intelligence to improve operations in an increasingly data-driven decision-making process. The projects underway include the Network Digital Twin, an exact replica of the assets with which simulations can be carried out in all possible conditions. This digital twin opens the door to data-driven network management, real-time control of the operation of different components, preventive maintenance and more efficient interaction with field personnel.
About Endesa
Endesa is the largest electricity company in Spain and the second largest in Portugal. The company is also the second largest gas operator in the Spanish market. Endesa operates an end-to-end generation, distribution and marketing business. Through Endesa X, it also offers value-added services aimed at the electrification of energy usage in homes, companies, industries and Public Administrations. A new business line has also been created, Endesa X Way, fully dedicated to electric mobility. Endesa is firmly committed to the United Nations SDGs and strongly supports the development of renewable energies through Enel Green Power España, the digitalisation of grids through e-distribución and corporate social responsibility (CSR). The Endesa Foundation is also active in CSR. Our workforce numbers around 9,260 employees. Endesa is a division of Enel, the largest electricity group in Europe.