The decision taken by the State government to provide free power to the farm sector is set to become a reality as the ball has already been set in motion. The government invited tenders for the 10,000 MW solar power project on November 30 and received bids from five companies in four weeks, according to an official release.
Officials are now gearing up to open the bids and put them through the process of of reverse tendering. The entire exercise is scheduled to be completed by the end of February, 2021. Care has been taken in preparing the tender documents in compliance with the guidelines laid down by the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy.
The documents were later sent to the Judicial Preview Committee (JPC) and uploaded to the website after being examined.
As many as 150 suggestions and objections have been received from the public. After this process, the officials referred the documents again with certain explanations to the JPC. The documents have finally been finalised.
The government has taken up the project with top priority to maintain quality and transparency through use of solar energy in the next 30 years thereby save ₹48,800 crore.
Consumption
Power consumption in the farm sector has been increasing every year even as the demand for new connections has increased.
According to Andhra Pradesh Electricity Regulatory Committee’s statistics, 12,221 million units of power is being consumed by 18.17 lakh electricity connections in the State and the subsidy for agricultural connections increased manifold in the past five years.
While there are 18.37 lakh agricultural connections, the production capacity is only 8,354 MW. The number of agricultural pump sets is increasing by 50,000 every year.
With this, the government has come to the understanding that solar energy is the only answer to make free power supply available in the farm sector.
