Indian State Of Punjab Launches 300MW Solar Power Tender
Image Credit: jkairvar | Some right reserved
The north Indian state of Punjab has issued a fresh tender for installation of 300 MW of solar power capacity.
The state joins list of several others like Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, and Andhra Pradesh to issue huge tenders for setting up solar power capacity.
Punjab lies in the west north-west belt of India which receives significantly high solar radiation making the region suitable for large-scale solar power infrastructure development.
Other states laying in the region, Gujarat and Rajasthan, boast over 90% of India’s installed solar capacity. Both the states have been pioneers in development of solar power sector in India.
While the size of the tender issued by Punjab is relatively smaller than those issued by some other states in the recent months. One of the reasons for this is the lack of wasteland in Punjab. It is prominently an agricultural state. States like Gujarat, Rajasthan, and southern states of Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh have vast areas of wasteland where large solar power projects can be installed.
Still, Punjab aims to increase the share of renewable energy capacity to 10% of the total power generation capacity by 2020. To achieve this target, the state plans to add 2,000 MW renewable energy capacity by 2022. Half of this capacity will comprise of solar power.
Due to the lack of wasteland, an expansion in the solar rooftop segment could prove highly beneficial for the state. Punjab suffers from substantial power deficit as demand from the agricultural sector is very high. A rooftop solar power scheme with a feed-in tariff structure would thus reduce this deficit and increase efficiency. Another area of expansion could be the canals and the irrigation system. Gujarat has announced plans to set up solar photovoltaic (PV) projects to cover irrigation canals, such projects also help in reducing the evaporative water loss from the canals.
The views presented in the above article are the author’s personal views only
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Excellent news that Punjab, India’s food basket is at last going solar. But its hydro potential, from five large rivers due to various reasons has not been fully utilized. It is a land of vast wheat, paddy, vegetable fields, with numerous canals with few waste lands. Its villages and towns are also scattered around the fields. Punjab could also try to exploit the high winds that blow over it . I had once tried to take a dip in the Indira Gandhi canal that brings the Sutlej waters to the Rajasthan desert.
It was ice cold in the canal while the desert air was around 45 deg Celsius. So despite all the evaporation, the cold of the Himalayas was little affected.