Spanish Energy Giant Endesa Abandons Renewable Projects in Morocco

Endesa is disengaging from renewable energies in Morocco. According to Challenge, the Spanish group has just crossed out its project to venture into Renewable Energies (RE) in Morocco. And yet, four years earlier, the Group had planted its flag through "Endesa generacion Morocco". Better, a recruitment campaign for several local experts in the green energy sector had even been conducted in 2017 for this purpose! Why then such a sudden change of course when the Moroccan market seems to be a natural expansion for the Endesa Group?

The same source reports that the answer to this sudden change of course is justified by the limits of the current regulatory framework governing private electricity production from RE, outside the projects awarded by the National Electricity Office (ONEE), in "Build own and Transfer" (BOT) mode. Added to this is the failure of Law 13-09 which, as early as 2011, materialized the liberalization of the green electricity sector in Morocco and the one that supplemented it in 2016 (namely Law 58-15).

This is justified by the frightening delays in the "permitting" process (the cycle from the preliminary studies to the final concession and the construction permit) but also by the government’s manifest inability to put in place the necessary implementing texts without which the profitability of a large part of RE projects is only a pious wish.

Even before the Iberian player, controlled by the Italian group ENEL, the world leader EDF, whose balance sheet in Morocco in terms of RE is still virgin, seven years after creating "EDF Maroc", has also experienced this difficulty.

Moreover, Endesa maintains a foothold in conventional electricity production through its 32% stake in the capital of the Tahaddart thermal power plant near Asilah, the same source notes.