Neyveli Lignite Corporation (NLC) has inaugurated the 130MW solar project in Neyveli in Cuddalore district of Tamil Nadu, the southernmost state in India.
The solar project has been installed on 655 acres of land and it has been built in two blocks of 65MW each. Under a power purchase agreement (PPA), the energy generated by the solar farm will be supplied to Tamil Nadu Generation and Distribution (TANGEDCO) at a price of INR5.1 ($0.08)/kW.In a filing to the BSE, the company stated: “As part of fulfilling its commitment towards the Green Initiatives of Government of India, NLCIL has now crossed a significant milestone by commissioning its prestigious 130 MW solar power project on 1 January 2018.” NLC had won the contract for the development of the solar project back in 2016 and back then, INR5.1/ kW was the lowest quotation.
Indian Ministry of Coal secretary Susheel Kumar was quoted by The Times of India as saying: “The 130MW solar power project has been implemented in two blocks of 65MW each.
“BHEL was engaged for executing one block of 65MW with deployment of indigenous solar modules and Jakson Engineers Pvt.Ltd was entrusted with executing another block of 65 MW with the deployment of indigenous solar cells and modules.”
With the solar project’s commissioning, the state’s solar projects in total have reached up to 1.99GW. It is estimated that there are nearly 2GW of more projects in the pipeline.
The project is built with a total cost of INR752.62cr ($118.6m) and it is estimated avoid the release of nearly about 216,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere compared to the fossil fuel, reported Cleantechnology.
