Mytrah to double wind power capacity to 600Mw

Company likely to break even in first half of this fiscal

Hyderabad-based Wind energy company Mytrah Energy Limited on Wednesday said it expects to make a profit before tax (PBT) of $10-12 million (Rs 52-62 crore) on a projected revenue of $28-30 million (Rs 146-156 crore) in the first half of the current financial year, its first operational period.

Founded in October, 2010, the London Stock Exchange-listed company has an operational capacity of 316-Mw in seven sites. It plans to take this to 600 Mw by investing Rs 2,000 crore in the next couple of years. The company expects to achieve a 16 per cent return on equity over a period of 25 years of plant life where the wind farm output is typically based on a 25-26 per cent plan load factor (PLF).

Explaining the reason behind the early breakeven, against the perception that the clean energy business take longer gestation, Ravi Kailas, chairman and CEO, said support of long-term funds, lower capital costs besides internal execution capabilities became a differentiator from other players in the sector.

The company has so far invested about Rs 2,400 crore. However, future expansion would become much easier and quicker if states like Andhra Pradesh moved the tariff from the present Rs 3.50 to Rs 4.50 per unit, according to him.

Higher energy output at 39 per cent PLF in view of good wind season would boost revenue accruals for the first half of the year but for the full year it could be around 26 per cent, he said.

About 270-Mw is under development for which the company has been investing around Rs 2000 crore. Of this, about Rs 700 crore of equity finance has already been raised by the company and it in talks with various banks to raise the debt, according to Vikram Kailas, managing director of Mytrah Energy.

“We expect to make a PBT of Rs 700 crore once we achieve the 600 Mw capacity. This cash flow would help in further expansion that we have proposed to undertake,” Kailas said. The company proposes to establish 5,000 Mw of installed capacity in wind energy with a total capex of Rs 30,000 crore by 2017-18.