Switzerland approves clean reserve electricity plants

The Cornaux gas-fired power plant is currently providing reserve electricity Keystone / Laurent Gillieron

The Swiss government has approved five electricity reserve plants powered by CO₂ neutral fuel, with a total capacity of 583 megawatts.

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Contracts with providers in the cantons of Valais, Aargau, and Basel Country are now being negotiated. The plants are expected to be operational between 2027 and 2030.

One is located in Monthey, Valais, and is operated by Cimo. Other plants include Sisslerfeld 1 (Getec) and Sisslerfeld 2 (Sidewinder) in Eiken, Aargau, one in Stein, Aargau (Getec), and Axpo’s Auhafen reserve power plant in Muttenz, Basel Country.

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The Getec plants will be powered by hydrogenated vegetable oil (HVO). This fuel is obtained from food fats, leftovers, and animal waste. Axpo plans to initially use HVO for its plant and, in a second phase, e-methanol.

The capacity of the five reserve plants corresponds to the electricity reserve recommended by the Federal Electricity Commission (Elcom). The costs of the electricity reserve will continue to be charged to consumers via the grid usage tariff and proportional to electricity consumption.

The Federal Department of the Environment, Transport, Energy and Communications is working on a transitional solution because the planned plants cannot seamlessly replace existing reserve power plants before the winter 2026/2027.

Contracts for two existing reserve power plants, with a total capacity of 336 megawatts, expire at the end of spring 2026. The energy ministry conducted a tender to replace these plants between July 2023 and March 2024. 

The tender was not pursued further because the bids were too costly. Instead, direct negotiations focused on minimizing costs and improving the time scale of the projects.

The revised offers were submitted at the end of February 2025. Eight offers for reserve power plants with a total capacity of just over 1,000 megawatts were received, before being pared down to five approved plants.

Adapted from German by DeepL/mga

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