Monday, July 08, 2013: Gujarat is already home to more than half of the nation’s solar power plants and on its last move, it seeks to make a cut back on the pay rate to projects. The state government is citing excess of profits for the power plant manufacturers as the reason. A petition for the same was submitted by the Gujarat Urja Vikas Nigam Limited which is a state run agency and the bulk of the power consumer. It stated that plant owners are profiting from windfall gains which are completely unjustified as reported by Bloomsburg News. A copy of the report was obtained by the news channel and the news has been confirmed by the chairman of Gujarat Electricity Regulatory Commission, P.K. Mishra.
The purchaser, GUVNL consumes a total of 971.5 MW solar energy and has signed contracts with 88 suppliers since the year 2000 and this included developers like Moser Baer India Ltd. (MBI), Adani Enterprises Ltd. (ADE), Welspun Energy Ltd. and Tata Power Co. (TPWR). The petition said that a reasonable and prudent rate for the consumption for every KWh should be Rs 9.0, which is far less than the average rate of Rs 12.54 signed for a period of 25 years under the current schemes.
The first hearing on whether the petition has grounds to be accepted is slated on 23 July as confirmed by Mishra. The GUVNL MD, Raj Gopal, however, didn’t respond to phone calls or emails for further clarification.
