The Hindu Business Line : Govt hopes to add 90,000 MW in 11th Plan

New Delhi, Sept. 11 Despite its dismal record at adhering to power capacity addition targets, the Centre has announced a scaling up of its power capacity addition target for the Eleventh Plan period (2007-12) to 90,000 MW, up from the earlier estimate of 78,577 MW.

“We will add 90,000 MW by the year 2012 to meet electricity demand of the nation,” the Union Minister of Power Mr Sushilkumar Shinde, told reporters on the sidelines of a FICCI event here.

Out of the earlier target of 78,577 MW of capacity, projects totalling 63,312 MW are under implementation, of which 18,177 MW are in the private sector.

The increase in the capacity addition target has been possible primarily on account of the inclusion of upcoming captive generation projects, as well as the first couple of units of the Sasan and Mundra Ultra Mega Power Projects, to the targeted 78,577 MW capacity.

Coal blocks

Mr Shinde said that work on 32 coal blocks having total extractable reserves of 9,916 million tonnes allotted to various state and central public sector units and Independent Power Producers (IPPs) was in progress.

“Along with thermal and hydro capacity addition, we are also now eagerly looking forward to very fast developments on the nuclear side in the wake of the very important diplomatic breakthrough that the country has achieved with the NSG waiver,” he said.

On the distribution side, Mr Shinde said, two key programmes are being implemented to turnaround the sector.

While the Rajiv Gandhi Grameen Vidyutikaran Yojana (RGGVY) was cleared for implementation during the Eleventh Plan period at a cost of Rs 28,000 crore, under which around 1,25,000 villages are to be electrified and 2.34 crore below poverty line households will be provided connections free of charge, the Accelerated Power Development and Reforms Programme have also been recently cleared for implementation in a revised format.

In order to provide impetus to the power distribution sector, Power Secretary Mr Anil Razdan said, “We are planning to modernise the distribution sector with the help of Information Technology (IT), and are also planning to make IT-based database monitoring compulsory.”

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