Tata Power, 5 others to build 500 MW solar projects in Karnataka

Six companies, including Tata Power Renewable Energy, ACME Group, Fortum Oyj of Finland, Yarrow Infrastructure Ltd, Adani Power and ReNew Power, have won bids to set up solar power projects with a total capacity of 500 megawatts (MW) at a solar park in Karnataka.

The companies quoted tariffs in the range of Rs4.78-4.80 per unit in an auction held by National Thermal Power Corporation on Tuesday, a spokesperson for NTPC said on Wednesday.

Four firms won bids for setting up 100MW units each at a tariff of Rs4.79 a unit and two 50 MW capacity units were auctioned at a tariff of Rs4.78 and Rs4.80 per unit, respectively, for the power projects to be built at the National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC) solar park at Pavagada in Tumkur district, Karnataka.

This, however, is above the tariff of Rs4.34 a unit at which Fortum Oyj of Finland had won a 70 MW plant in NTPC's solar park at Jodhpur in Rajasthan in January.

Fortum won 100 MW capacity at Rs4.79 per unit for 25 years at Tuesday's auction as well, the company stated.

Tata Power Renewable Energy on Thursday announced that it has won two solar-grid connected photovoltaic projects of 50 Mw capacity each in Karnataka.

"Company's 100 per cent subsidiary, Tata Power Renewable Energy Ltd (TPREL) has won two Solar grid connected photovoltaic projects of 50 MW capacity each in Pavagada Solar Park in the Tumkur district of Karnataka," the company said in a statement.

The projects have been awarded through open category under Jawaharlal Nehru National Solar Mission (JNNSM) Phase-II Batch-II Tranche-l under 'State Specific Bundling Scheme', the statement added.

Manoj Kumar Upadhyay, chairman, ACME Group, said his company won a 100 MW capacity at the solar park in Karnataka at Rs4.79 a unit.

''In order to get the footprints all over the country, it was important for us to have a presence in Karnataka. We are happy that we have secured this tender and have managed to get it at the right price – a price we are comfortable at,'' the company quoted Upadhyay as saying.

RattanIndia arm Yarrow Infrastructure Ltd is reported to have quoted the lowest price of Rs4.78 per unit to bag a 50 MW project.

Adani Power quoted a price of Rs4.79 per unit and bagged 100 MW.

ReNew Power, backed by Goldman Sachs in India, won 50 MW by quoting Rs4.8 per unit. All bids were in the open category of solar cell procurement.

India launched the Jawaharlal Nehru National Solar Mission (JNNSM) in 2010 with the aim of adding 20,000MW or 20 gigawatt (GW) of grid-connected solar power to India's energy mix by 2022 in three phases.

That target was raised to 100 GW by 2022 by the National Democratic Alliance government in 2015.

Under JNNSM, the government-provided solar parks offer project developers ready-to-use infrastructure, such as land and transmission facilities, leading to low project risk and lower costs.

The developers will sell power from the projects to NTPC Vidyut Vyapar Nigam under a 25-year power purchase agreement

NTPC, which is in the process of setting up 1,000 MW renewable power by 2017, has already commissioned 110 MW of solar power capacity. It is in the process of setting up another 15 MW solar and 8 MW small hydro power capacity.