Weekly Market Analytics Chile Vol 12 Num 9

VOL 12 | NUM 9 | 22 September 2025

Power Markets Weekly

CHILE | 8 - 14 September 2025

Power Markets Weekly is a brief weekly review of the electric market operation in Chile, Mexico, Iberia, France and Italy. If you are not a subscriber, please feel free to subscribe here

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We return after a short break to celebrate our national holidays in Chile. We hope all our readers who had the opportunity to participate in these celebrations enjoyed meaningful moments with good company.

Glossary

4.0% decrease in demand reflects, in part, the impact of notably higher temperatures on heating needs

Global SEN operation

The average price in Polpaico was USD 35.4/MWh, 36% lower than last week and 4% lower compared to one year ago.

Marginal cost evolution in Polpaico during past years

This week, maximum temperatures were higher than last week across the entire system, resulting in reduced heating needs, which added to the clock change to summer-time, likely influenced the 4.0% drop in demand.

This demand reduction impacted the generation mix with thermal resources reducing their participation: gas by 3.6 pp and coal by 1.7 pp. The decrease in coal generation was particularly pronounced on Wednesday night and Sunday solar hours, where the demand reductions met a higher wind availability. In total, solar participation increased by 3.5 pp, run-of-river by 1.5 pp and wind by 0.5 pp.

Regarding BESS, its participation increased by 0.1 pp, with maximum output reaching 1.1 GW at 9 PM on Saturday, when the technology accounted for 10.8% of the supply.

Peak demand of the week reached 11.5 GW at 11 AM on Monday, when solar and wind accounted for 70.4% of the supply.

Generation Mix

Variation

Power range by energy sources (average prices)

Learn more about this chart

Generation evolution

Geothermal

Cogeneration

Biomass

Coal

Gas

Oil

BESS

Dam

Run-of-river

Wind

PV Solar

CSP

This week, the system was mostly coupled with the main congestions seen in the following lines:

500 kV line Nueva Pan de Azúcar – Polpaico, between 8 AM and 9 AM of Tuesday, decoupling the system north of Polpaico.

220 kV Charrúa – Santa Clara line, on the nights and early mornings from Monday to Thursday, as well as on Sunday, and 220 kV Lastarria – Ciruelos on Saturday morning. These congestions decoupled Puerto Montt leaving it to operate with lower prices and at times zero prices, due to the excess of renewable energy.

Peak price of the week was on Monday morning at 7 AM, when prices ranged between USD 138.9/MWh in Puerto Montt to USD 164.2/MWh in Crucero. For most of that hour, oil power plant “Los Pinos” set the price.

In terms of USD 0/MWh prices, they appeared for 69 hours from Crucero to Pan de Azúcar, for 68 hours in Polpaico and Charrúa and for 87 hours in Puerto Montt.

Marginal cost evolution

Crucero
USD 35.6/MWh

D. de Almagro
USD 35.0/MWh

Pan de Azúcar
USD 34.7/MWh

Polpaico
USD 35.4/MWh

Charrúa
USD 33.8/MWh

Puerto Montt
USD 24.1/MWh

Solar and Wind production & BESS dispatch

Solar output increased by 8.3%, adding 16.6 GWh compared to the previous week. Aside from Puerto Montt, which recorded a compound average plant factor of 13.6%, all other regions showed similar values, ranging from 19.8% in Diego de Almagro to 23.4% in the Crucero area. The compound average solar plant factor of the system was 21.6%.

On the other hand, Wind generation decreased by 0.7%, meaning a reduction of 1.6 GWh compared to last week. The lowest compound average plant factor was seen in Diego de Almagro with 12.0%, while the highest one was in Puerto Montt with 34.2%. The compound average wind plant factor of the system was 23.4%.

BESS injections decreased by 0.9%, representing a reduction of 330 MWh compared to last week. The largest percentage increase occurred in the Polpaico area, with injections rising by 6.8% (+147 MWh), while the most significant decrease was observed in the Charrúa area, where injections fell by 24.5% (-237 MWh).

Given the higher solar availability this week and lower demand, solar curtailment rose by 4.1 pp (+20.8 GWh), reaching 21.1%. Wind curtailment also increased, up by 2.4 pp (+7.8 GWh), reaching 16.6%. The compound average curtailment rate of the system was 19.4%, 3.4 pp higher than last week. It is to note that these values do not consider curtailment information of Friday as it was not available on CEN data.