Karnataka denying right of way to Southern power grid: Goyal

The capacity of India's southern electricity grid has increased 89 per cent in the last three years and the Centre plans to double it in the next three years, Power Minister Piyush Goyal said on Monday while blaming the Karnataka government for posing hurdles to these plans.

"We have improved the capacity of southern grid by 89 per cent and will double the capacity in the next two-to-three years. However, Karnataka is not providing the right of way for drawing power lines," Goyal said in response to a query at a briefing here on three years of the NDA government.

"The media should flag this off to the state government," he said.

The Union minister said there is currently no shortage of power in any state, including Karnataka, and if a state wants to purchase power it is available at a price of Rs 2.40 per unit.

"There was no constraint in availability in the Power Exchanges during the peak demand period of summer and power was available at around Rs 3-3.50 per unit. The average price was around Rs 2.50 per unit," Goyal said.

Goyal, who is also Minister for Coal, Mines and New and Renewable Energy, said the state miner Coal India Limited is going to set up 1 GW of solar energy power generation, and will later work towards achieving 10 GW of renewable power capacity addition.

--IANS

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