HOUSTON, TEXAS (Pietro D. Pitts, Energy Analytics Institute, 1.Mar.2025) — Mexico’s president Claudia Sheinbaum Pardo inaugurated the Salamanca Combined Cycle Central of the Federal Electricity Commission (CFE) in Guanajuato. The plant will contribute 927 megawatts (MW) to the National Electricity System and benefit an estimated 5 million people in the Bajío area.
Sheinbaum, speaking on 1 Mar. 2025 during the inaugural event in Guanajuato, reiterated that soon CFE, a public company of the state, would be integrated vertically again and its subsidiaries would be eliminated.
“We recently changed the Constitution and now CFE has returned to being a public company of the state. And it has an additional condition: it cannot be considered a monopoly. CFE can generate the amount of electricity that our country and the nation require,” Sheinbaum said in a video of the inauguration on the government’s YouTube channel.
Sheinbaum said her government had recently signed secondary laws linked to constitutional reform, which recovers energy sovereignty and recovers CFE.
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“So I tell you that very soon, probably this year, CFE will be integrated vertically again and there will no longer be subsidiaries that generate so many problems in the operation,” Sheinbaum said.
Mexico to add 7,527 MW of capacity
Mexico’s Energy Secretary Luz Elena González Escobar said that as part of the recovery of CFE that Mexico would add 7,527 MW of capacity over the next 2 years.
González said during the inauguration that would be possible owing to works that commenced during the 6-year term of former president Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO). González pointed to the Salamanca Combined Cycle Plant as a case in point. The plant will use natural gas and completely replace the old thermoelectric power plant that operated for 55 years, she said.
Mexico’s expansion plan by 2030 aims to add 21,846 MW with an investment of over $29bn, she said.
In addition, González announced that Salamanca II will be developed and add another 1,500 MW of capacity to the plant, without giving more details.
CFE general director Emilia Esther Calleja Alor stressed that this plant is the first of several projects with which Mexico aims to regain control of the National Electric System, with the contribution of 927 MW for an average annual energy generated of 7.3 terawatt hour operating with natural gas, which is equivalent to taking 750,000 cars out of circulation.
Calleja said during the inauguration that thanks to the cooling system with the latest technology, the plant would significantly reduce the use of water equivalent in proportion to 1,000 to 1.
“The objective is clear, president [Sheinbaum]: to provide electricity to Mexican households at the lowest possible cost. Our interest is not profit, our interest and our only purpose is to guarantee Mexico’s electrical sovereignty,” Calleja said.
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By Pietro D. Pitts reporting from Houston. © 2025 Energy Analytics Institute (EAI). All Rights Reserved.
