UAE to invest $163 billion to diversify energy
The United Arab Emirates announced today plans to invest 600 billion dirhams ($163 billion) in projects to generate almost half the country’s power needs from renewables. “Our aim is to balance our economic needs with our environmental goals,” Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum said on Twitter as the Gulf state unveiled its “Energy Strategy 2050”. The UAE is a top oil exporter, but has taken steps to reduce its dependency on fossil fuels to generate power, including building nuclear facilities. The country’s energy mix by 2050 will comprise 44 per cent from renewables, 38 per cent from gas, 12 per cent from clean fossils and six per cent from nuclear energy, said Sheikh Mohammed, who is also the UAE’s vice president and the ruler of the emirate of Dubai. “The plan aims to increase usage efficiency by 40 per cent and increase clean-energy contributions to 50 per cent,” he wrote. In June, Dubai announced plans to build a 1,000-megawatt solar power plant by 2030, the year it aims to turn to renewable energies for 25 percent of electricity needs. In 2014, Abu Dhabi opened the world’s largest operating plant of concentrated solar power, which has the capacity to provide electricity to 20,000 homes. South Korean firms are also building four nuclear reactors west of Abu Dhabi, which are expected to generate 1,400 megawatts by 2020. The Gulf states are located in one of the world’s sunniest regions but they are far from being world leaders in solar energy. Mitchell Trubisky Womens Jersey
How solar rooftop plants are cheaper backup than DG sets
Solar rooftop units could be a much cheaper option for large apartment complexes, which usually depend on polluting diesel generator sets for power backup. A new study by the Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) has found that the cost of using solar plants is less than half of what one would spend on a DG set. The study released on Tuesday reveals that the cost of power generation from a DG set, including the capital cost, is Rs 27-33 per unit, compared to rooftop solar tariff of Rs 10 per unit. Though most consumers perceive solar power to be expensive, prices of panels have fallen sharply in the past few years, thus bringing down the cost of rooftop projects.The cost of solar panels account for 50-55% of the total project cost. The photo voltaic module prices have fallen from 1.95 euros per watt in March 2010 to 0.53 euros in July 2016. “The cost of electricity generation through solar rooftop with battery backup comes to around Rs 7-8 per unit, which is half the cost of electricity supplied through DG sets. In addition, rooftop plants can reduce the monthly bill of the consumers as the extra units generated through these plants can be supplied to the grid,“ the report said. To compare the costs of solar rooftop and DG sets, CSE, along with cKinetics–an advisory firm–conducted a feasibility study of five housing societies in Delhi, Haryana, UP and Rajasthan. Two of these are Satisar in Dwarka, which has 245 flats and a 112 KW DG set (partial backup).Satisar faces an outage of about 48 minutes per day . The other is ICON in Gurgaon, which has 344 flats with a1,112 KW DG set (full backup). ICON faces about 16 minutes of outage per day . The team assessed the feasibility based on various parameters such as rooftop area, load needs and average outages. Two models were considered–Capex–the residential society pays for the capital costs of installing the solar rooftop and RESCO, under which installation is done by a developer. Societies pay a pre-decided tariff on a monthly basis. Under both models, the cost of supply of power was between Rs 6 and Rs 9 for all the societies. As a backup system for outages, a rooftop plant will work only if it has battery storage. In other words, it’s like an inverter fuelled by clean energy , experts explained. A BSES Rajdhani Power Limited official has clarified that solar rooftops will have to work with reliable grid supply since they cannot provide full backup unlike DG sets. “Solar rooftop can meet basic needs during brief outages but cannot provide full backup (power to run energy-intensive appliances like ACs),“ he said. The report reasons that with the decrease in duration of outages, the use of DG sets in residential societies has declined to only 200-300 hours per year. The BSES official highlighted that there were other benefits of having a solar rooftop plant–they could bring down power bills apart from providing backup during outages. Julius Peppers Authentic Jersey
Centre accuses UP Government of false power position claim
The Centre is miffed with Uttar Pradesh’s claims about its power situation and has alleged that the pollbound state has been fudging data to project zero electricity deficit. Official sources said the state is not providing accurate data on supply and details on implementation of Ujwal Discom Assurance Yojna (Uday) to hide slow progress. The Centre had earlier clashed with the state after the Union ministry declared a village in Hathras district with no power connectivity as electrified. Uttar Pradesh Power Corporation chairman Sanjay Agarwal did not respond to calls and messages sent by ET. A top power ministry official questioned the data provided by Uttar Pradesh on the ministry’s mobile applicationcum-portal Vidyut Pravah, which shows real-time power position in a state and the price at which it can purchase electricity from the power exchange. The portal showed that Uttar Pradesh faced 1.2 per cent power deficit and 3.1 per cent peak-hour deficit on Tuesday, meeting demand for about 12,000 MW. “The state faced a high power deficit when the electricity demand was at 11,500 MW a few weeks back. How can it claim to have met the demand with the addition of just 500 MW?” he said. Data available with the Central Electricity Authority (CEA) shows Uttar Pradesh’s peak-hour deficit in January last year stood high at 16.1 per cent despite meeting power demand of 11,625 MW. The CEA, too, compiles the power supply position report based on data provided by states. The power ministry official said given federal structure, data provided by states cannot be questioned by the Centre. The power ministry had earlier clashed with the state after media reports highlighted that villagers of Nagla Fatela in Hathras district, referred as electrified by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his Independence Day speech, did not have electricity. Modi had said that although Nagla Fatela was only three hours away from Delhi, it had taken 70 years (since Independence) for electricity to reach there. Media reports, however, said villagers were using ‘katia’ connections, or tapping electricity illegally from agricultural feeders. Power minister Piyush Goyal on Wednesday launched a mobile application and portal to track implementation of Uday by states. Goyal said his ministry will launch schemes to incentivise performing states that are a part of the Uday scheme. Telangana and Assam on Wednesday joined Uday, taking the count of states that are part of the discom revival scheme to 20. Telangana is likely to reap a net benefit of Rs 6,116 crore and Assam about Rs 1,663 crore through Uday, an official statement said. Tamil Nadu, with discom losses of Rs 50,000 crore, is likely to join Uday this week. Cortez Kennedy Authentic Jersey
Wind power tariff may nose down to Rs 4-4.5 per unit in the latest 1,000 Mw auction
Wind tariff is likely to come in between Rs 4 and Rs 4.5 per unit — below the average of around Rs 5 — in the auction being conducted by SECI to set up 1,000 MW capacities for supply of power to non-windy states. The state-run Solar Energy Corporation of India (SECI) is likely to complete the bidding of the wind projects by the month end. “The average tariff of wind power is around Rs 5 per unit. SECI has not provided any benchmark tariff in the auction. But it is likely to range between Rs 4-4.5 per unit, which would be below the average of Rs 5 per unit at present,” a source said. On response to the auction, the source said, “The companies generally submit bids on the last date. We are expecting good response. The last date for submitting financial bids is January 9, 2017. After that, it will take about three weeks to complete the procedure.” Later last year, SECI had floated tenders for total wind power capacity of 1,000 MW. The competitive bidding is tariff based and will be awarded to those quoting the lowest price (power tariff). SECI will tie up long-term power purchase agreements of developers with non-windy states to whom power will be supplied through the central transmission utility. Under the scheme, the government will not acquire land or equipment as developers will have to do that on their own. They would also run and maintain their plants. According to the scheme, the project capacity will be determined by SECI for each tender, but will not be less than 25 MW for a single project developer at one site. SECI is the nodal agency for implementation of this scheme and is working on the e-bidding process followed by e-reverse auction for eligible bidders. It will also develop a suitable mechanism for project monitoring. It has been stipulated that no separate funding shall be provided by the ministry to SECI to implement this scheme. The objective is to facilitate supply of wind power to non-windy states at a price discovered through transparent bidding. The wind power deployment in the country started in early 1990s. The current wind power installed capacity is nearly 28.08 GW, accounting for around 9 per cent of the total installed capacity of 310 GW. Globally, India is at 4th position, after China, the US and Germany, in terms of wind capacity installation. The Centre has set an ambitious target of 175 GW power from renewable energy resources by 2022 and out of this, 60 GW has to come from wind power. Alexander Nylander Womens Jersey
SECI to call 2,300 Megawatt solar power bids soon: MD Ashvini Kumar
Solar Energy Corporation of India (SECI) will shortly float tenders for putting up of solar power projects with capacity of 2,300-mw, its managing director Ashvini Kumar said on Monday. The corporation has committed to finalise tenders for producing 5,500-mw of solar energy, of which PPAs to produce 3,200-mw are already in place and tendering process for remaining 2,300-mw of solar power projects are at various stages of implementation, Kumar said. The tenders will require companies to source domestic equipment partially, he said. Tendering for 100-mw of rooftop solar power has also been approved for government buildings by the new and renewable energy ministry, he said. “Following encouragement from the government to spur up and promote Make in India, SECI has been specifying in its tendering documents domestic content in solar power plants to also ensure level playing field for indigenous developers of such projects”, he said. He said Tamil Nadu has taken lead setting up solar power projects with total capacity of 1,590-mw until now followed by 1,370-mw and 1,158-mw by Rajasthan and Gujarat respectively whereas Andhra has succeeded in creating a substantial solar capacity in its geographical landscape. M Kamalakar Babu, managing director, New & Renewable Energy Development Corporation of AP said the state will set up an energy university is for which a draft bill would be produced in the state Assembly in its budget session. Wes Horton Authentic Jersey
Bihar, Jharkhand may face power outages with NTPC Kahalgaon facing coal issues
Bihar and Jharkhand are likely to face major power cuts soon, as their main power supplier is facing the possibility of a total shutdown in the next three days as it isn’t getting coal to run the plant since the Rajmahal mine accident. The 2,100 MW Kahalgaon Thermal Power Plant of NTPC supplies the bulk of power to the two eastern states and its source of fuel is Coal India’s Rajmahal mine. Since the December 29 accident that killed several miners, it hasn’t received any coal and the stock is depleting steadily. NTPC has already shut one of the plant’s 500 MW units. It is now running at 60 per cent capacity — 20 per cent less than on normal days.”Farakka and Kahalgaon power stations have been receiving around 45-50 tonnes of coal per day on normal days from Rajmahal. This has stopped since December 29,” a senior NTPC official said. “If we do not receive any coal in the next three days, we would be forced to shut down all units of the station,” he warned. An official from Coal India said Rajmahal has stocks of around 8 lakh tonnes of coal. “We have applied for a permission from the Director General of Mines to transport this coal to power stations. If the permission is received and we are able to transport the coal, it could ease the situation at both Farakka and Kahalgaon,” he said. Derek Carrier Authentic Jersey
Tamil Nadu set to join UDAY after months of reluctance
Tamil Nadu will join the Central government’s power utility turnaround scheme Ujwal Discom Assurance Yojana (UDAY) on Monday, after months of reluctance, becoming the 21st state to bail out state-owned distribution firms struggling with mountains of debt. Tamil Nadu’s signing up for UDAY comes after some of the utilities showed signs of turnaround with the help of steps meant to cut power theft and improve efficiency. Former Tamil Nadu chief minister J. Jayalalithaa had firmly opposed the UDAY scheme and some progress was made when Union minister of state for power Piyush Goyal met her at the secretariat on 15 July. Goyal had then stressed that the state will save at least Rs22,400 crore of discoms’ debt in the next three years. According to data from the Central government, the Tamil Nadu Generation and Distribution Corp. (TANGEDCO) has an outstanding debt of about Rs75,700 crore as on September 2015. Out of this, 75% of the debt belonging to distribution business alone will be taken over by the state as the turnaround scheme does not cover power generation business. Tamil Nadu has time till end of March 2017 to take over the debt, which will not be counted for the state’s borrowing limit of 3% of gross state domestic product. Unlike in many other states, Tamil Nadu has not separated power generation and distribution activities into different corporate entities. Jayalalithaa had earlier requested Prime Minister Narendra Modi to consider certain requests of the state government and “ensure that the State finances are not adversely affected, while taking over the debt of TANGEDCO”. Haryana’s Dakshin Haryana Bijli Vitaran Nigam Ltd was the first power utility to turn around under UDAY. It reported a profit of Rs201 crore in the first half of 2016-17 from a loss of Rs479 crore in the full financial year 2015-16, a power ministry analysis of utilities’ health showed last month. Assam and Telangana had joined the scheme on 4 January. The other states that are still not part of UDAY are Sikkim, Karnataka, Kerala, West Bengal and Odisha. Erratic electricity supply became the rallying point during the 2011 election campaign and toppled the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam’s (DMK) to make way for the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK). Even during the 2014 general assembly election, it was top on the agenda. Recently, in the run-up for the 2016 assembly election, the AIADMK promised up to 100 units of free electricity. The scheme has been implemented since the party came into power for the second consecutive term in May last year. In Tamil Nadu, where consecutive governments have projected electricity as a welfare scheme through highly-subsidised electricity tariffs, the state has been wary of the Centre’s interference and has seen it as a threat to its federal framework. The same applies for other Central government schemes like good and services tax (GST), National Food Security Act (NFSA) and National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET). While the state has strongly opposed these schemes, critics have claimed that the state compromised its stand after Jayalalithaa’s hospitalisation on 22 September. The 68- year-old died on 5 December. “Apart from GST, the chief minister also opposed UDAY, as the tariff will have to be revised every three months, and NEET, as it will hit rural students. She had opposed the Food Safety Modernisation Act too. But when the chief minister is in hospital, the government has approved all the proposals by surrendering itself to the Centre,” said DMK leader M.K. Stalin on 8 November. Jamie Oleksiak Womens Jersey
Power Ministry to give major thrust to hydro power, says Piyush Goyal
There will be a major thrust on hydro sector by different ways to bring down cost of electricity from this renewable source, Power Minister Piyush Goyal said today. “I shall be going later this week to Arunachal Pradesh also to review some of the power projects. In coming few months, we want to give major thrust by different ways to bring down the cost of hydro power,” Goyal told reporters here. “Hydro power is also renewable energy. We are working on a position paper after studying all international experiences, we will look very seriously to see whether these should be categories as renewable power,” the minister said. In the present scenario, the small hydro projects up to 25 MW are treated as renewable energy while others do not get incentives being provided by the government for encouraging clean energy. New & Renewable Energy Ministry is in the process of drafting a Cabinet proposal to reclassifying large hydro power plants as renewable projects, a move which can help India achieve clean power capacity of 230 GW by 2022. India has set an ambitious target of adding 175 GW of renewable energy capacity by 2022 which includes 100 GW of solar, 60 GW from wind, 10 GW from bio-power and 5 GW from small hydro-power (up to 25 MW capacity each). Of the 310 GW installed power generation capacity, 43 GW comes from large hydro projects (above 25 MW) and 46 GW from other renewable power generation capacities. The minister further said, “We would like to encourage the (hydro power) sector after it is categorised as renewable, speed up the projects, get back all the stalled projects and some support to the hydro sector because it is one sector which gives you sustainable quality power for over 100 years.” The minister commended Tamil Nadu for joining UDAY scheme and expressed hope that Kerala, Sikkim and West Bengal would also join the scheme meant for revival of debt-stressed distribution companies. A senior official said, “Sikkim will become the 22nd state to join UDAY scheme this month only while Kerala has also given its in-principal consent to join the scheme.” The official further said that after Kerala (with Rs 6,000 crore debt) joins the scheme, about 95 per cent of total discoms debt of Rs 4 lakh crore would be covered. Under UDAY scheme, 92 per cent of the total debt of discoms in the country has already been covered today under UDAY after Tamil Nadu became 21st state to join the scheme. However, the official said West Bengal (with Rs 13,000 crore debt) is going slow on the move but would eventually join the scheme. Later in the day, Goyal dedicated the world’s largest street light replacement in South Delhi Municipal Corporation area where two lakh LED lights replaced inefficient lamps. James Van Riemsdyk Authentic Jersey
Union Budget 2017-18: Govt should address GST, demonetisation concerns, says Hartek Power
The upcoming Union Budget for 2017-18 must address the concerns of the industry related to the impact of the Goods and Services Tax (GST), demonetisation and provide for fiscal incentives to boost the domestic manufacturing of solar panels, Hartek Singh, Chairman of Chandigarh-based Engineering, Procurement and Construction (EPC) firm Hartek Power, has demanded. The government should address the concerns associated with GST and demonetisation by announcing measures which boost investments and limit the possible fallout of the two policy decisions, Singh told ETEnergyWorld in an exclusive interview. “While the upsurge in cash volumes in banks as a result of demonetisation will bring down interest rates, which will further boost investments in the power sector, GST will also turn out to be a game changer in the long run,” he said. The first generation entrepreneur also said the Modi government should announce special incentives for the renewable energy sector to offset the possible increase in project costs owing to GST but added it could be rather premature to foretell the impact of GST on the power sector as the GST Council is still in the process of giving a final shape to the new tax regime. The Power System EPC business vertical of the Hartek Group registered a revenue of Rs 75 crore in 2015-16. In the current financial year, the company is expecting to generate a revenue of Rs 150 crore from the EPC business, a twofold increase over last year, Singh said. In the solar domain, Hartek Power undertakes EPC projects from independent power producers (IPPs) and specialises in grid connectivity. At the end of March 2016, Hartek Power had connected 258-Megawatt solar projects to the grid. With 460-Mw orders in its kitty in the first half of the current financial year, the company is all set to execute more than 500-Mw solar EPC projects in 2016-17 alone. “The government should encourage indigenous manufacturing of solar panels so as to reduce dependence on imports by extending special concessions to domestic manufacturers on one hand and increasing import duty on the other. India is heavily dependent on imports for solar panels owing to limited manufacturing capacities and high cost of financing. Low-cost finance options can go a long way in promoting the Indian solar panel industry,” Singh said. He added that the government must also allocate more funds for Research and Development (R&D) to introduce cutting-edge power technologies. India has the opportunity to become a manufacturing powerhouse if home-grown technology is given the attention it deserves under the Make in India campaign, he said. Singh also said the he expects the government to allocate more funds for upgrading grid infrastructure for renewable energy projects and announce incentives to attract private investments in the Transmission & Distribution (T&D) domain. Pavel Bure Authentic Jersey
Suzlon bags 105 MW order from Axis Energy Group in Andhra Pradesh
Wind turbine maker, Suzlon Group today said that it has bagged 105 mega watt (MW) order from Axis Energy Group in Andhra Pradesh. “The project consists of 50 units of S111 90 metre tubular tower, each with a capacity of 2.1 MW. Located in Andhra Pradesh, the project is scheduled for completion in two phases,” the company said in a BSE filing. While, the first phase will be completed in March 2017 and the second phase will be completed in June 2017, it said. Stefan Matteau Authentic Jersey