The Central government has asked the National Committee on Transmission to prioritise the areas with high renewable energy potential when planning new electricity transmission projects.

“For enabling growth of renewable energy capacity, areas which have high solar or wind energy potential will need to be identified and connected to bulk power evacuation systems so that capacity can come up there,” the Ministry of Power announced on Friday in an order amending the committee’s mandate.

The committee is stipulated to assess the trend of growth in electricity demand and generation in various regions and propose the construction of new transmission systems after identifying constraints in the inter-State and inter-region transfer system. The Central government awards intra-State and inter-State transmission projects through auctions by REC Transmission Projects Company Ltd.

Potential areas

The highest potential for solar energy in the country lies in Gujarat, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Chhattisgarh, according to an ISRO study.

The new order also appointed Power System Operation Corporation Ltd CMD KVS Baba to the committee, which is headed by Central Electricity Authority Chairperson Prakash Mhaske.

The order also widened the committee’s scope to formulate packages for the transmission schemes for their implementation and to recommend their mode of implementation through either tariff-based competitive bidding or regulated tariff mechanism, as per existing tariff policy, to the Ministry of Power.

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