Why a small tourist island off of Brazil is ditching diesel for solar

Fernando de Noronha’s main island is only seven square miles. At about 220 miles off the northeast coast of Brazil, it is also isolated.

A UNESCO World Heritage Site, the archipelago is one of Brazil’s most famous tourist destinations. Visitors come to see its lush vegetation, huge volcanic rocks, and blue ocean waters teeming with dolphins, sharks, turtles and all sorts of fish.

Noronha is home to around 3,000 residents, but a record of over 139,000 tourists visited the archipelago last year, roughly 5% above the limit set by the government.

Until recently, the electrical grid that served those residents and tourists was powered by a diesel-fueled thermal plant.

Now, 30,000 solar panels are being installed right in front of the airport, and the new power plant will generate 22 megawatts of electricity.

A few miles away, solar panels are also floating over a dam powering water desalination, necessary because the island doesn’t have a water source. The aim is to make the area almost completely carbon-free by next year as part of a wider effort across the country to shift to solar.

For many Noronha residents, the switch is a no-brainer.

“It will reduce pollution on the island, diesel is very polluting,” Felipe do Nascimento Silva, a server at a beach shack, said in Portuguese.

Many residents wanted the solar panels to be installed on their roofs to avoid clearing any forests on the island. But Leonardo Moura, operational superintendent of Neoenergia, the company that distributes electricity in Noronha, said they couldn’t do that because they needed the plant to be equipped with a battery system that stores energy to serve the island at night.

“Our goal was to have the least possible impact. The solar panels will occupy 1.5% of Noronha’s territory,” Moura said in Portuguese. He said the project was approved by the Ministry of Energy and followed all environmental regulations.

Moura said the diesel plant will still be in use, serving as a backup during rainy days, starting next year.

“For more than 11 months a year, the island will be 100% carbon-free,” he said in Portuguese.

The new plant costs $70 million and is being built in partnership with the federal and state governments. And, according to Moura, it won’t require customers to pay higher fees.

More than 40% of Brazil’s electricity comes from hydropower, but solar is growing — already in second place with 25%.

Solar panels are also being installed in remote regions of the Amazon as part of a federal program. Almost 1 million people in that region don’t have access to electricity.

John Wurdig, energy transition manager at the nonprofit Arayara, believes solar power makes sense for Noronha.

But he said the archipelago also needs to improve energy efficiency because many public buildings are old, and that the newer, fancier hotels need more electricity.

“There are hotels with one jacuzzi per room. That’s a crazy idea for an island that has the most beautiful ocean in the world,” he said in Portuguese.

In addition to the transition to solar, a ban on combustion vehicles was supposed to take effect in Noronha last year. But that’s on hold until 2030.

Support for this story was provided by a PSC-CUNY Award, jointly funded by The Professional Staff Congress and The City University of New York.