Procedures to Make Projects About Renewable Energy Generation Connected to the Grid in Colombia

This article addresses the needed formalities in order to present projects about renewable energy generation connected to the grid in Colombia. The definitions given by the Household Utilities Law and the Electricity Law, known as Laws 142 and 143 of 1994, respectively, about the generation activity and the topics to consider established by the second one for the development of grid connected projects that every interested individual must accomplish are discussed. The applicable normativity is presented for generation projects with power rating from 500kW and 20MW, which are considered by the regulation as a minor generators plants as well as the objectives that the Colombian state must accomplish, according to the Law in the Non-Conventional Energy Sources (FNCE for its acronym in Spanish) integration to the National Interconnected System (SIN). Finally, registration characteristics for generation projects, environmental licenses, connection points assignment, and energy commercialization procedures established by the law are given. On May of 2014 the Colombian government issued the Law 1715 [1] promoting and encouraging the use and implementation of Non-Conventional Energy Sources in the country. But, nowadays the Law 1715 has huge gap specifically for the regulation of this sources (FNCE), and any operator or electricity Generation Company with interest in the developing of energy generation from FNCE has to accomplish the current regulation (Laws 142 and 143 of 1994). This paper presents the methodology that any solar PV project connected to the grid must accomplish with the current Colombian regulatory framework.