Mexican Senate votes to give constitutional preference to state power company

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Mexico's Senate voted to amend the country's constitution late on Wednesday to give dispatch preferences to state electricity company CFE, cementing the national power generator's preferential status above foreign or private competitors.

The initiative passed the upper chamber of Congress with 86 votes to 39, meeting the requirement of two-thirds support to change the constitution.

The constitutional reform will require national grid operator Cenace to prioritize power generated from the CFE's power plants, even if it is more costly than power supplied by private producers.

The proposal already passed the lower house of Congress last week, with support from the leftist ruling Morena party of President Claudia Sheinbaum.

The constitutional overhaul of dispatch rules will take effect once it passes a majority of state legislatures, and is then published in the government's official gazette.

Like her predecessor, former President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, Sheinbaum has sought to give more control of Mexico's energy market to state-owned power company Comision Federal de Electricidad (CFE).

Lopez Obrador sought to enact the same change during his term, but was thwarted by legal challenges.

(Reporting by Adriana Barrera, additional reporting by Natalia Siniawski; Editing by Bernadette Baum)