Portuguese renewable energy company EDP Renovaveis SA (EDPR.LB) said Friday it is trying to mitigate the risks of volatile energy prices in Spain by making forward sales.
"The Spanish energy market this year has a very high volatility compared to 2008, so what we've decided is to mitigate part of that risk with forward sales, we have fixed a sale price for a great part of our energy in Spain (for 2009)," Chief Financial Officer Rui Teixeira said at a press conference in Madrid.
Teixeira added that the volatility is one of the "less positive" aspects for the Spanish market in 2009.
Spain is a major market for EDP Renovaveis. The company has about 2.1 gigawatts of renewable energy generation capacity installed in Spain and slightly more in the U.S.
Earlier Friday, EDP Renovaveis said its 2008 net profit totaled EUR104.4 million, boosted by the strong growth of its U.S.-based wind power business.
The company, which listed on the Euronext Lisbon stock exchange in June, didn't provide a comparable figure for the same period a year earlier, but said its pro-forma 2007 net profit was EUR4 million.
EDP Renovaveis is a unit of Portuguese utility EDP Energias de Portugal SA (EDP.LB), which is expected to release earnings March 5.