F. Minissale, G. Viglianesi, M. Catena
ENEL, Passo Martino Zona Industriale 95121 Catania, Italy
Tel +39.095.7481273, Fax +39.095.291246, E-mail francesco. minissale@enel. it,
giovanni. viglianesi@enel. it, mario. catena@enel. it

Summary

ENEL, the Italian Electric facility, carried-out the realisation of a Hybrid plant in Ginostra, an isolated village of Stromboli Island, to comply with the specific needs of the residents, taking into account the available energy resources and the prescription of the Sicilian Environmental Department for the Aeolian Islands. The plant consists in a stand-alone system feeding an isolated electric mini-grid that is developed for about 2 km to reach all the village houses even the most remote ones. The specific peculiarity of Ginostra village is a high variability in the residents’ number: about 50 people in winter and approximately 600 during July and August. So as to reach a best exploitation of the production capacity of the plant, a desalination system will be realised in a second time and it will constitute a periodical load to store water during the low occupation period (winter) and cover the demand in the summer. The plant realisation, financed by the Sicilian Regional Administration with 2,8 Million EUR, has started on July 2003 and its completion was on February 2004. Also the works for the mini grid realisation were completed for that period. The plant is already in operation.

ENEL performed the design and the realisation of the PV-diesel Plant, putting it in running condition and for the following seven years will supply the plant normal operation, assuming the burdens of the system ordinary maintenance.

The visual impact of the plant and of its support infrastructures are rather reduced, thanks to the selected position, visible only from mainland and from few areas. To such aim the typical plants of the Mediterranean bush, present in the PV-plant area, have been preserved in a nearby land, so as to be able to be put back again around to the PV-plant area in order to reduce its visual impact.