Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated the 750-megawatt Rewa solar panel in Madhya Pradesh on Friday (July 10). The Rewa solar park, a joint effort involving Madhya Pradesh Urja Vikas Nigam Ltd. and the Solar Photovoltaic Authority of India, built the solar facility (SECI). The programme has also obtained financial support from the national government of Rs 138 crore. 

Three solar electricity generating units are positioned on a 500-hectare block of land within a 1,500-hectare power station to make up the facility. The three businesses that signed a contract to construct the three power stations are Mahindra Renewable Power Pvt, Arinsun Green Technology Pvt, and ACME Rajasthan Solar Energy Pvt, with the majority of the machinery imported from China.

What are the Plant’s Constituents?

The project consists of three 250 MW plants. For the first time in India, the selection of procurement method of contracting for projects was used for this venture, with Mahindra Renewable Sources, ACME Solar Shareholding, and Solengeri Power arising as the awards for the project’s three components, with tariff increases of Rs 2.979, Rs 2.970, and Rs 2.974 during the first year, respectively.

The Power Grid Association of India has constructed the 220/400 KV cross-functional and cross-electricity network under the road network to accommodate power rescue operations from the development site to purchasers. The International Monetary Fund (IMF), a World Economic Forum corporation, has engaged nearby for $440 million but rather Rs 2,800 billion in total in the project. It is also India’s first international finance corporation and a Green Systems Fund-funded project.

Innovation

RUMSL received PPP transaction advice and services from IFC, which included conducting commercial, constitutional, and scientific due diligence, simulating a revenue structure, designing a transaction structure, and preparing bankable endeavour contracts to incorporate a large-scale capital enterprise without the need for financial support or subsidies.

IFC assisted RUMSL in creating bid papers and developing an algorithm for an alternative online marketplace procedure that emphasised flexibility to stimulate competitiveness.

IFC advised the two salvagers on a unique win-win power scheduling arrangement that allowed Delhi Metro to draw electricity flexibly to meet the fluctuating nature of its rail demand. This would be the first time in the Indian power market that this arrangement has been reached. The deal used India’s open access legislation to allow solar electricity to be sent across state lines and used to power trains in the nation’s capital.

Impact and Outcomes

Without governmental viability breach assistance, the lowest percentage ever given for a renewable PPP in India was 4.4 US dollars a kWh. Grid parity was established at this price, implying that solar power was as cost-effective as other traditional power-generating technologies such as coal.

In Madhya Pradesh, a historically low-income province, the initiative’s productive assets totalled USD575 million throughout capital funding.

A few of the project’s structural features of the REWA solar project were incorporated into the Ministry of Human Resource Development Energy’s National Solar Procurement Guidelines.

The initiative resulted in reducing 1 million tonnes of greenhouse gases per year.

The Delhi Metro Corporation would receive 24 percent of the electricity produced, while the Madhya Pradesh Voltage Regulation Corporation would receive 76 per cent.

Importance

• The nation’s first solar power plant to breach the grid’s comparability threshold.
• When an alternative source can create power at a price of electricity that is less than or equivalent to the cost of grid electricity, this is referred to as grid parity.
• Furthermore, it obtained the first-year pricing of Rs. 2.97/component with a tariff increase of Rs. 0.05/unit across 15 years, based on average solar project rates of around Rs. 4.50/component in early 2017.
• The Ministry of Environment and Energy has endorsed its payment security approach for lowering risks to power companies as an example for other governments.
• It would be the first renewable electricity project in Madhya Pradesh to serve an organisational client outside the state, namely the Delhi Metro, which would get 24 per cent of the project’s fuel, with the other 76 per cent going to the state’s DISCOMs.
• India’s first renewable development to get finance from the World Bank’s Clean Innovation Fund (CTF), which offers 0.25 per cent interest for a 40-year term.
• The CTF encourages scaled-up finance to demonstrate, implement, and transmit low-carbon technology with considerable long-term carbon emissions reduction possibilities.
• It will contribute to reducing 15 lakh tonnes of CO2 emissions per year.
• It also got the International Monetary Fund’s Government Award for quality and creativity and was featured in the anthology- A Book of Advancement: New Beginnings.

Conclusion

In 2010, India announced the Solar Energy Mission to add 100 GW of solar electricity by 2022. The Indian government has implemented Rewa solar park plan that entails grouping solar producers on nearby land lots that connect external electrical circuits and internal drainage facilities. The Madhya Pradesh Output Management Ltd., which would get 76% of the factory’s power, and the Delhi Government, a freely accessible consumer, would be the first solar project in India where multiple types of consumers have agreed to buy electricity.