Govt floats tender for first solar power plant in Faridabad

Bijendra Ahlawat 

Tribune News Service

Faridabad, November 18

The tender of the first solar power plant to be set up in the city has been released. With the initial capacity of 30 MW, Haryana Power Generation Corporation Limited (HPGCL) plans to generate a total of 90 MW of solar power here in near future.

The first plant will come up in Sainik Colony of Sector 49 here with an installed capacity of 30 MW and the construction work is expected to start within the designated period after the opening of the bid on November 28.

According to officials concerned, this plant is likely to benefit over 30,000 consumers who will be able to get uninterrupted power supply. Though the district has around 6.5-lakh consumers at present, the supply fell short of the demand, which reaches its peak in summer months. The demand of power touched 190-lakh units between May and August. 

“As the industry is one of the sectors that is heavily dependent on power, any cut or shortage makes the units to switch over to generators, which proves costly in terms of manufacturing costs,” says Col S Kapoor of the Faridabad Industries Association.

“To deal with the power shortage and meet the growing demand, the HPGCL has approved the setting up of a solar plants of the total installed capacity of 90 MW in the city in future,” said a senior official of the department. 

The tender of the first plant was a move in this direction, he said, adding that the generation of the full capacity of 90 MW would provide a relief to around 90,000 consumers. 

Notably, the HPGCL had to close a 210-MW coal power station located at Bata Chowk here several years ago as it had completed its life and had been a cause of air pollution. Haryana has now set a target of 3,200 MW of solar power to be generated by 2021-22. The current installed and commissioned solar capacity in the state is 73.27 MW.