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Engineering major L&T is set to bag a Rs 2,100-crore engineering, procurement, construction order for a 300 MW solar power plant coming up in Tamil Nadu.
The solar park is coming up in a joint venture of the INDarya Green Power Pvt Ltd and the Tamil Nadu Government’s industrial development arm, TIDCO. The INDarya group owns the President Hotel in Chennai. The park is coming up near Manamadurai, where INDarya already has over 2,130 acres of land in its possession.
A 300 MW solar park would typically call for an investment of about Rs 3,000 crore.
The project developers do not intend to get into electricity generation. The idea is to develop a solar park in a modular fashion — 300 plants of 1 MW each. These plants will be sold to those who wish to own solar plants and sell electricity. In an e-mail response to BusinessLine query, A. Jagannathan, Head-Projects, INDarya, said, “Larsen and Toubro would do the EPC and will handle all technical aspects related to the park.” On a ballpark basis, a EPC contract is not less than Rs 7 crore a MW.
The project features a 230 kV sub-station within its premises. The developers promise complete infrastructure such as roads, lights, water, drainage and natural fencing.
A key selling point is the ‘solar purchase obligation’ mandated by the Tamil Nadu Government. All specified consumers (or ‘obligated companies’) are mandated to buy 6 per cent of their consumption from solar power plants from next year, says P.V. R. Krishna Rao, CEO, Earthcare, a consultancy that advises INDarya on this project. (The SPO, however, has been challenged by the Tamil Nadu Spinning Mills Association with the Appellate Tribunal for Electricity.)
The project developers further say that those who buy the solar power plants in the park will be eligible for ‘renewable energy certificates,’ which are generation-based market tradeable instruments.
“All statutory obligations will be fulfilled by our team through the single window clearance system since the project is handled by TIDCO,” Jagannathan has said in his letter.
ramesh.m@thehindu.co.in
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