Power Transmission
Pablo Tarca, general manager of Transener, said the opening of Argentina's electricity market is colliding with a lack of transmission infrastructure.
He made the point at the “Electricity Sector Deregulation” roundtable of the eighth edition of the National Energy Forum (Fórum Nacional de Energía), which LIDE Argentina held on Thursday, November 5, at the Alvear Icon Hotel in Buenos Aires under the name “Argentina Global Energy 2026.”
“I believe that for the deregulation of generation and distribution to be a success, it needs a transmission infrastructure that we don't have today,” the executive said.
The panel, moderated by Nadia Sager, CEO and founder of GEINSA, brought together the three links of the power chain. Alongside Tarca were Fernando Bonnet, CEO of Central Puerto, one of Argentina's largest power generators, and Daniel Marx, chairman of Edenor, Argentina's largest electricity distributor. When introducing Tarca, the organizers noted that Transener had just received the Premio Fortuna award for best electricity company. Transener, Argentina's main high-voltage transmission company, operates almost 12,400 km of transmission lines, according to the company.
“Our role is to be in the middle, between what generation supplies and what demand needs,” Tarca said, describing the role of transmission.
Tarca Sees Power Transmission as a Natural Monopoly That Needs Clear Rules and Predictability
For Transener's general manager, the basic condition for the segment is that clear rules exist. “The fundamental thing is that things are written down, the operational safety protocols are there; the issue is that they are enforced, and I think that is the most direct way for signals to appear so that we get infrastructure,” he said.
Asked by the moderator how to sustain the system's reliability without losing competitiveness, Tarca rejected the idea that the two goals are incompatible. “At first glance it might seem impossible to have a system that is both secure and competitive, and that's not the case. The point is to have rules,” he said.
The executive explained that, because of the country's geography and the rules of the game, power transmission in Argentina is a natural monopoly. “What monopolies need to have are regulations that are enforced clearly, and not intervention,” he stressed. In his view, intervention strips the system of predictability, and that lack of predictability makes companies such as Transener inefficient.
With Demand Above 65% of Peak, the System Dispatches Everything It Has
Tarca argued that the lack of transmission capacity limits how the market that deregulation seeks to build can function. “When you have demand above 65% of peak demand, it doesn't let you do dispatch engineering, because you have to dispatch everything you have in order to supply. So economic theory collides with a very large lack of infrastructure,” he said.
According to Transener's general manager, for generation to compete and for demand to find the best offer, the system needs a grid that does not exist today, and the path to building it starts with demanding technical compliance with procedures. He also warned that, with the current grid, whatever solutions are adopted are only enough to supply immediate demand. “What we are talking about, and what our colleagues in generation and distribution need, is the long term. For that, you need infrastructure,” he said.
Tarca Calls for AMBA I, the First Project in the Expansion Plan Tendered by the Secretariat of Energy
Tarca put the focus on AMBA I, a transmission expansion for the Buenos Aires Metropolitan Area (AMBA). “AMBA I has to go ahead,” he said. As progress over the past two years, he highlighted that there is no longer any debate about which works are needed. “What we need is for the works to actually get built,” he added.
The executive traced the problem back to the sector's reform in the 1990s. “From the start, in the '90s, the great Achilles' heel of the electricity market has been that the signals for transmission infrastructure to appear never worked,” he said, adding that very few kilometers of lines were built under the written rules.
It is the same diagnosis Tarca took in September to the Mendoza Energy Summit, where he said that “today there is no link in the electricity market chain that isn't clear on the diagnosis that transmission is the great bottleneck.”
AMBA I is the first of the 16 projects in the National Power Transmission Expansion Plan, which calls for investment of more than $6.6 billion and 5,610 km of 500 kV lines nationwide, according to Argentina's Secretariat of Energy. Those expansions were declared a priority by Resolution 715/2025 of the Ministry of Economy, published in Argentina's Official Gazette on June 2, 2025, with the aim of having the private sector take charge of their construction, operation and maintenance. Decree 921/2025 subsequently established that they be carried out as public works concessions under Law 17,520.
The Secretariat of Energy called the AMBA I tender through Resolution 202/2026, published in the Official Gazette on August 12. The project calls for about 270 km of new 500 kV, 220 kV and 132 kV transmission lines, a new 500/220/132 kV Plomer transformer substation, reactive compensation systems and complementary works, with a maximum construction period of 52 months. It adds 2,160 MVA of new capacity and carries an estimated investment of $800 million.
The winning bidder will be able to apply to join Argentina's Large Investment Incentive Regime (RIGI). In October, the Executive Board of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) also approved a $200 million investment guarantee, with a 25-year term, to back AMBA I and the Puerto Madryn–Choele Choel and Choele Choel–Bahía Blanca corridor.
For Tarca, what happens with that tender carries a weight that goes beyond the project itself. “What is happening with AMBA I is truly foundational. We have to make an effort for it to work,” he concluded. Bids are due in December, and the Secretariat of Energy expects to award the project in the first months of 2027.