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Ahead of a scheduled pre-bid meeting for the development of 2,000-Mw solar power in Telangana, the state officials have assured private developers that the government would provide all support, including land, to them.
Speaking at a two-day ‘EQ Solar Leadership Summit’ here on Wednesday, Telangana State Industrial Infrastructure Corporation (TSIIC) managing director Jayesh Ranjan said the government was holding brain-storming sessions on ways to facilitate the development of solar projects by taking care of land and evacuation issues.
Earlier this month, the state government had notified the bidding schedule beginning with the filing of request for selection (RFS) by prospective developers to award projects with an aggregate capacity of around 2,000 Mw through tariff-based competitive bidding.
The government will enter into power purchase agreements (PPAs) with the successful bidders for procurement of solar power for a period of 25 years. Having 300 sunshine days in a year with average insolation of 5.0 kWh/m2, the state would offer a short gestation period for such projects, officials said.
While May 15 has been set as the deadline for submission of bids by private developers, successful bidders would be issued letters of intent (LoI) on June 22 and finally PPAs would be signed on July 21, 2015. The government has set an upper ceiling for procurement tariff at Rs 6.45 per unit for group 1 bids which would inject power at 33/11 kv substation level and at Rs 6.32 per unit for projects that are connected to the grid at 133/33 kv and above voltage levels.
Rolta Power associate director Bhupesh Trivedi said investors had enough funds to develop solar projects though practical problems such as land and other issues had been holding them back from aggressively pursuing the projects. He also suggested the government should provide room for more small size projects with 3 Mw capacity unlike in the earlier bidding process conducted for an aggregate capacity of 500 Mw in which 70-80 per cent projects went to big players.
Indian solar association chairman C Narasimhan requested the state government to create a land bank for solar projects as the availability of land was the biggest problem in way of solar power development across the country. State power utilities are holding a pre-bid meeting on Friday with the prospective developers to clarify on various issues and motivate them to participate in the competitive bidding process.
