The handing over of the Mundra ultra mega project to Tata Power is probably the only positive development in the power industry over the last few months. It will add around 4,000 Mw of power to the system over the next six years. But the plan to dot the country with similar power plants on a fast-track basis will still be a long haul as recalcitrant-to-greedy state governments are either not willing to give land for the project or are demanding a free share in the power generated. Prospective bidders for these projects have also become more demanding and are no longer satisfied with sketchy "in-principle" clearances""each project requires 17 clearances""but prefer to wait for the actual approvals before signing on the dotted line. Not surprisingly, the Power Finance Corporation (PFC)""which is the nodal agency for facilitating these projects""is not in a position to say how many of the proposed nine ultra mega power plants will actually be off the ground in 12 months. With the 70-odd months it takes to get these projects working, power from these ultra mega projects seems a long way off, giving rise to concerns that this policy may also meet the same fate as the one on mega power projects (1,000 Mw or above) formulated in the nineties. | |
| There is also scepticism over the plan to add 78,000 Mw of generation capacity in 2007-12""in the yet to be finalised 11th plan""since the country has added just about half of the 41,000 Mw that was planned in the last five years. At a time when the annual demand for power is growing at 7-8 per cent, and there is already an existing deficit which needs to be plugged, the country can ill afford these failures. Overall, there is hardly any visible sense of urgency in the government to address the problem of power shortage. Voluminous policy documents and empty words are surely not enough. |
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| There are some who argue that adding generation capacity when the transmission and distribution (T&D) losses are at a whopping 35-40 per cent is like pouring water into a leaky bucket. They also say that the target of a 12-15 per cent loss ratio seems just a pipe dream considering that the T&D losses have been increasing in quite a few states even after spending thousands of crores of rupees under the Accelerated Power Development and Reform Programme. There is no doubt that the government has done precious little to address this problem and something has to be done urgently. But it is also equally true that the country may soon be left staring at an empty bucket if there is no urgent addition to capacity. |
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