CPI to investigate energy distributors has support in the Chamber of Deputies

It is in the hands of the president of Câmara dos Deputados, Arthur Lira, the establishment of the CPI (Parliamentary Inquiry Commission) that will investigate the performance of energy distributors in the DG (distributed generation) market.

This Tuesday (19), the author of the request, the federal deputy Lafayette de Andrada, who is also the president of FREPEL (Mixed Parliamentary Front for Clean Energy), announced in the House plenary that the minimum number of 171 signatures of deputies had been reached for the establishment of the CPI. The expectation is that, at the latest, upon the return of the parliamentary recess, the CPI will be officially established.

“Energy distributors throughout Brazil have taken coordinated action against distributed generation. Without complying with the law, they do not provide connection permits for new systems. As a result, thousands of small companies and rural producers are unable to connect due to the obstruction of distributors who, illegally, reject orders. The CPI is necessary and today we officially filed the request for its creation”, said the president of the CPI in plenary. FREPEL.

According to the parliamentarian, the commission's objective is precisely to analyze possible irregularities committed by electricity concessionaires with regard to non-compliance with deadlines for distributed micro and mini generation connections and also in relation to the numerous rejections due to reversal of the flow of orders for the installation of new self-generation systems.

The request for the creation of the CPI highlights that electricity distributors have repeatedly failed to comply with the deadlines set out in the rules related to MMGD connection requests, causing immense losses to the clean energy sector and consumers with connection requests.

The document also points out that distributors have indiscriminately used the same justification – that of inverting power flow – to deny thousands of requests for connection to new distributed generation systems.

Industry view

INEL (National Institute of Clean Energy) is one of the entities representing the sector that supports the creation of the commission. INEL's president, Heber Galarce, highlights that the distributors have not presented the necessary technical studies that demonstrate that the inversion of power flow causes significant disturbances or disruptions in the distribution network, as required by the standard, in reference to Resolution 1.059 of the ANEEL (National Electric Energy Agency), published in February of this year.

According to him, the actions of distributors, with the imposition of obstacles in the analysis of Connection Processes for the installation of new distributed microgeneration projects, have generated major economic and social impacts.

“The establishment of the CPI, as quickly as possible, will be important to resolve this bottleneck in the solar energy sector. Distributors have denied connection requests arbitrarily and without technical justifications. This stance leads to company closures and unemployment in the sector. Precisely in an activity capable of generating countless jobs throughout Brazil, as it has wide reach and is largely made up of small companies”, he said.