Juan Béjar, president of Bruc: “It is false that nuclear energy helps energy independence” | Companies | EUROtoday

Through the window of an workplace of the vitality firm Bruc comes the sunshine of a chilly and sunny morning at first of December in Madrid, optimum circumstances for the two.1 GW of put in capability of its photovoltaic vegetation to succeed in their most manufacturing degree. On a day like this, the corporate covers 10% of the 20 GW demanded by the Spanish electrical energy market. This is said by its founder and govt president, Juan Béjar (Madrid, 68 years previous) in an interview he provides on the event of the tenth anniversary of the creation of Bruc. With a protracted enterprise historical past behind him—the event of Ferrovial’s infrastructure enterprise; the IPO of Cintra; the creation of Citi’s infrastructure fund; or the revival of the FCC group—, the supervisor doesn’t keep away from the open debates in his sector: he forcefully rejects the extension of the Almaraz nuclear energy plant, in Extremadura, and exhibits his frustration on the system’s incapacity to fulfill latent demand. “It would allow this country a wild boost in its economic activity,” he maintains.

In a state of affairs through which not solely Spain, however many surrounding international locations are contemplating extending the helpful lifetime of their nuclear energy vegetation and even constructing new ones, Béjar denies one of many essential arguments put ahead by those that defend this place: vitality sovereignty. “When you are a country that does not produce uranium, it is false to say that nuclear power helps energy independence.” And a lot much less, he provides, “if you have to buy it from questionable countries, like Russia.” Furthermore, the businessman regrets the absence of a debate on the waste generated by this vitality and, in financial phrases, it’s not defined “that there is talk of extraordinary remuneration for nuclear (the PP proposed fixed-price contracts in December) when renewable energy is sold at prices close to zero.”

The electrical energy market has been going through the issue of low costs for a while due, based on Béjar, to the excess of vitality technology, “which triples demand in the middle of the day,” he factors out. In this context, the good challenge that the businessman places on the desk emerges: the demand that the system can not meet. According to electrical energy firms, in 2024 greater than 33 GW of grid entry requests have been denied, 49% of requests. They additionally warned that 83% of the connection nodes are presently saturated. “If we were able to release demand, the price problem would not exist,” Béjar states emphatically.

The implications of the regulator, on this case the Government of Spain, fixing this example would go additional, he assures: it could contribute to job creation and facilitate the development of housing, an issue that he factors out because the “biggest in the country.” The Ministry for the Ecological Transition introduced in September an funding of 13.6 billion euros in transport networks to extend their capability.

In the businessman’s opinion, the decoupling between demand and technology has slowed down funding in renewables. From the sector, “the way that producers have to defend themselves against low prices is to store the megawatts generated and release them during the hours when prices are most reasonable.” It refers back to the development of batteries, a expertise that Bruc is dedicated to and not using a trace of doubt.

In the second half of 2026, the corporate hopes to extend the capability of its parks by 2.2 GW with the set up of batteries, an answer referred to as hybridization. This plan is added to the 0.7 GW in photo voltaic panels that might be related, Béjar declares, within the coming weeks. Between put in and underneath growth, the corporate has a portfolio of 6.6 GW. On its stability sheet, it values ​​its property at 4,000 million euros and data 600 million in company debt unfold throughout a dozen entities.

The firm led by Béjar skips the primary of the three phases of a photovoltaic challenge, which consists of figuring out the placement, buying the land and acquiring permits. Once that stage is accomplished by a 3rd get together, Bruc purchases the longer term park. This scheme, he says, avoids “the risk of development” and has allowed them to develop a lot quicker.

During the execution of the works – the second section – the corporate maintains the connection with the developer from whom it has acquired the challenge. “The day we make the last payment is when we start the plant,” says the chief. From there begins the third and last section: exploitation, now solely within the arms of Bruc, which additionally retains management of the entry factors, one of many firm’s differentiating components, based on its president. The firm is an unbiased producer that, in contrast to built-in producers, corresponding to Endesa or Naturgy, doesn’t enter the vitality advertising enterprise.

In 2015, Béjar detected a sector with similarities to infrastructure, the one he knew finest, and through which, based on him, he noticed scope to create worth: renewable vitality. Bruc’s journey started in Japan. A system of fastened gross sales costs made Japan a really enticing place to spend money on photovoltaic parks, he remembers. In 2017, the chance arose in Spain with regulatory adjustments that facilitated entry to the transportation community. It was in that 12 months when the investor Ontario Teachers Pension Plan joined, a fund that manages pensions for Canadian academics and which immediately controls 50% of the corporate’s capital. The different half was left within the arms of USS in 2021, one other pension fund for academics, on this case British.

Pension funds are the right journey companion

These are buyers with a vocation for permanence, says Béjar, who function underneath a lifelong funding technique and don’t depend upon entry and exit cycles to generate profitability. “They are the perfect travel companions,” remarks the businessman, “I have risked my entire financial life with them. Their response? Spectacular.”

Without worry of a change in shareholders, the primary concern of Bruc’s managers is to proceed their dedication to renewables. This supply of vitality pursues, based on Béjar, three targets: the struggle towards local weather change, decreasing the worth and vitality independence. “Put the order you want according to whether you believe in one thing or another,” he says. The businessman considers the Donald Trump Administration’s dedication to fossil fuels to be unhealthy information, which is defined, based on him, by financial points: “The United States is a major producer of fossil energy, and I understand that maintaining part of the activity of a fundamental sector for them is a priority.” On the opposite hand, it positively values ​​the other instance of China, which, with its funding in renewables, has achieved “the greatest emissions reduction that any country has ever achieved in the shortest possible period of time.”