India opens doors to Chinese power equipment makers

India has decided to allow power equipment makers from China to set up power equipment service centres (PESCs) in India as the market for Chinese power  gear in India has grown manifold.

India's ministry of power and China's National Energy Administration signed an agreement to further strengthen and deepen cooperation in the energy sector under the India-China strategic economic dialogue mechanism.

Since India has become a strategic market for Chinese power equipment manufacturers, setting up of the PESCs in India would enable timely servicing of plant and equipment, optimise maintenance and operation costs, and eliminate risks from outage maintenance cycles.

Chinese power gear manufacturers have so far commissioned 18 GW of thermal power projects in India, under the 11th Five Year plan, using Chinese equipment and about 40 GW of power projects are currently under construction using Chinese-made equipment.

India is also looking at the possibility of Chinese investment through opening industrial, Manmohan Singh said at the conclusion of the visit to Beijing.

''Sharing the common understanding that setting up of the PESCs in India would enable render timely service to plant owners, help optimise maintenance and operation costs, and eliminate risks where possible from outage maintenance cycles,'' according to the agreement.

The memorandum of understanding is intended to define general ways of cooperation between the parties to establish the said PESCs in India.

The service centres would be adequately provided with equipment, personnel, spares and other facilities so as to enable them to provide all requisite spars and services support within India.

The PESCs to be set up in India will work on market principles. The costs and terms of servicing power equipment will be decided between the PESCs and the end user.

And, despite India's huge trade deficit with China, the two sides said they have set a bilateral trade target of $100 billion by 2015.

Meanwhile, the ministry of road transport and highways of India and China's ministry of transport signed an MoU on cooperation in roads and road transportation.

The two sides recognised the significant mutual benefit that can be derived by the participants from cooperation on roads and road transportation matters.