On September 19, 2012 the 23rd Annual General Meeting of Powergrid held at New Delhi, where Mr. R.N. Nayak, Chairman & Managing Director, Powergrid gave the bird eye view of the FY 2011-12 highlighting the various developments and the future plans of the company. The turnover of the company as on 31st March, 2012 reached five figures, crossing Rs. 10,000 crore and the net profit above Rs. 3,000 crore for the first time, a visible growth surpassing the expectations of all. Keeping pace with changing business environment, the company, this year, has set its ‘Vision’ to be “World Class, Integrated, Global Transmission Company with Dominant Leadership in Emerging Power Markets Ensuring Reliability, Safety and Economy” and aligned its mission and objectives accordingly. Here we present the excerpts of the his address at the 23rd AGM of Powergrid.
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Economic and Business Milieu
Indian economy is amongst the fastest growing economies of the World and being hailed as an emerging economic superpower with its average growth rate of about 7% per annum, even during the years of financial crisis. If it is to sustain this growth rate for the next 20 years, we need to quadruple our present power generation capacity of about 200 GW. Towards this direction, about 55 GW has been added during XI plan alone, which is about two and a half times of the X plan capacity addition and more than the combined capacity generation during the VIII, IX and X plans. The share of the private sector in the capacity addition has gone up substantially from 10% during the X plan to 33% during the XI plan and it is envisaged to be more than 50% in the XII plan. Though, India is one of the largest energy producers of the world, its per capita primary energy consumption is only 820 kWh against the world average of about 3,300 kWh. With the development taking place in the country, it is projected that India would become the 3rd largest energy consumer by the year 2020 after USA and China. As economic growth rate provides insight into general direction and magnitude for the nation’s overall economy, setting up of adequate and efficient infrastructural facilities becomes inevitable for prolonged sustenance. Therefore, enormous challenges stand in front of all the utilities in power sector towards fulfilling the objective of providing reliable, quality, and affordable power, on demand to all categories of consumers.
Powergrid – Where Meeting Challenges is a Way of Life
The company continued to maintain its high reputation and brand “Powergrid” by commissioning the transmission system, as per the agreement for evacuation of power from the first Ultra Mega Power Project in the Country at Mundra in September 2011, despite most challenging conditions like, environment & forest clearances, passing through tough terrains in creek area of Arabian Sea, severe right of way problems, excessive water logging due to heavy rains, etc.
Performance Highlights
On the front of project implementation, company displayed an excellent performance by adding about 10,600 circuit km of transmission lines, 15 new sub-stations and transformation capacity addition of more than 30,000 MVA to its large transmission network
On the operational front, company surpassed its own records by maintaining high availability of 99.94% of its vast transmission network of over 95,850 circuit km of Extra High Voltage transmission lines, 157 substations and transformation capacity of 144,300 MVA (as on September 14, 2012), the highest availability attained by the company since inception. Further, the number of trippings per line was also contained at optimum level of 0.59, which is comparable with international benchmarks.
During the year, investment approvals were accorded for 43 new projects with an estimated cost of about Rs. 39,225 crore involving about 16,900 circuit km of transmission lines, 22 new sub-stations and transformation capacity of about 56,000 MVA and HVDC terminal capacity of 3,000 MW and OPGW cable laying project of 16,200 km, which were taken up for implementation.
On the financial performance front, an all time high Asset Commissioning of Rs. 14,021 crore was achieved, which is almost double as compared to Rs. 7,313 crore in last fiscal. Capital investment of Rs. 17,814 crore was also made, a significant increase of nearly 50% over last year
The company continued to expand its portfolio in consultancy business, both domestically & internationally and presently, 115 domestic consultancy assignments having project cost of about Rs. 19,000 crore are under execution. The company made its debut footprint by garnering business in 4 more countries during the year, namely Myanmar, Kenya, Ethiopia and Tajikistan, thus making its presence to 11 countries.
The company has also set up its first international joint venture company, “Power Transmission Company of Nepal Limited (PTCN)” in Nepal, for implementation of Nepal portion of Muzaffarpur (India) – Dhalkebar (Nepal) transmission line under India-Nepal interconnection. In support of the Govt. of India’s initiative of Rajiv Gandhi Grameen Vidhyutikaran Yojana, company created infrastructure for electrification in 9,358 villages and provided service connections to about 678,300 BPL households during FY 2011-12. Cumulatively, till March, 2012, infrastructure has been created for electrification of 64,803 villages and service connections have been provided to about 33.57 lakh BPL households.
Technology Leader
The development of world’s highest transmission voltage level of 1200 kV UHV-AC has become a reality with the test charge carried out at the National Test Station at Bina in Madhya Pradesh in February, 2012.
The company’s first ±800 kV HVDC multi-terminal transmission system for bulk power transmission from Biswanath Chariali, Assam in the North-Eastern region to Agra in the Northern Region, about 2000 km, is under implementation and upon completion, this system will be amongst the world’s longest ±800 kV HVDC multi-terminal system with power transfer capacity to the tune of 6,000-8,000 MW.
The company is also exploring application of high temperature superconductor cable in Indian power system as it offers very high power carrying capacity at lower voltage, besides extremely low losses, for effectively addressing the right of way issues as the cable is embedded in the earth.
HVDC technology is presently being sourced mostly from outside the country. Towards indigenous development for making the country self-reliant, company has taken initiative for open collaborative effort with indigenous manufacturers for development of HVDC/FACTS technology and HVDC/FACTS equipment manufacturing facilities.
Moving Towards One Nation – One Frequency
During the FY 2011-12, inter-regional power transfer capacity of 5,600 MW was added with commissioning of Rourkela-Raigarh 400kV D/c, Sasaram-Fatehpur 765kV S/c & Gaya-Balia 765kV S/c lines. With the year’s addition, the inter-regional power transfer capacity of National Grid was enhanced to 28,000 MW at the end of XI plan, doubling the capacity of 14,100 MW as at the end of X plan. Commissioning of these inter-regional links has strengthened the inter-regional grid capacity of Eastern Region with Western Region and Northern Region. Currently, the country is operating as one of the largest synchronous grid in the world, with integrated Northern, Western, Eastern and North-Eastern regional grids having total installed power generation capacity of 153 GW. Marching towards the realizing the dream of “One Nation – One Frequency”, Southern Regional grid is envisioned for synchronous interconnection by first quarter of 2014 with the completion of Raichur-Solapur 765kV transmission system.
Conclusion of XI Plan and Beginning of XII Plan
At the end of XI plan, a capital investment of about Rs. 55,300 crore was made by Powergrid as against the target of about Rs. 55,000 crore for development of inter-state transmission system.
During the XI Plan, transmission network addition of 33,500 circuit km, 46 EHV sub-stations and Trans-formation Capacity of about 65,000 MVA was achieved.
Generation capacity addition of about 76,000 MW is envisaged during XII Plan, in which large numbers of generation projects are coming-up in resource rich states, i.e. Odisha, Jharkhand, Sikkim, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh under private sector.
Maintaining the trend of more than doubling the capex in each five year plan, Powergrid has planned a capex of over Rs. 100,000 crore during XII plan with current year’s capex pegged at Rs. 20,000 crore. The company has put in place a robust road map and concrete action plan for achieving the above investment programme, for which investment approvals have already been accorded for projects worth over Rs. 84,000 crore and contracts placed for over Rs. 70,000 crore.
Telecom Business
Powergrid presently has an all India Broad Band Telecom Network of about 25,000 kms, which is likely to be more than double in 2-3 years with multiple self resilient rings for backbone as well as intra city access networks connecting more than 200 cities and towns across the country. Total order book of telecom business rose to Rs. 1,050 crore from Rs. 650 crore in previous year, an increase of 62%, despite the rough weather in the telecom industry. During the last year 11 new customers were added on its network. The NKN project is already under implementation and yielded a revenue of about Rs. 45 crore during last year. The NOFN network is being carried out in about 89 districts covering 1,769 blocks across these four States, at an estimated cost of about Rs. 3000 crore.
Smart Grid Solutions
Towards bringing efficiency and sustainability in power sector for meeting the growing electricity demand with security, reliability and quality, it is prudent to introduce intelligence in all areas of power supply delivery chain – generation, transmission and distribution, through Smart Grid Technology solutions. Smart Grid shall facilitate efficient and reliable end-to-end intelligent two-way delivery system through smart transmission & distribution system as well as integration of renewable energy sources.
In this direction, company is developing a pilot smart grid/city in Puducherry which shall be a consumer-utility interactive system covering smart metering, control & communication through advanced metering infrastructure, power quality management, peak load management, outage management system, integration of multiple forms of renewable energy sources, micro-grid, storage technology, electric vehicle etc. The pilot smart grid/city is being developed through open collaboration in these fields with 63 organizations.
Green Energy Corridors – on the avil
To harness the green energy, government of India is taking various initiatives in the area of renewable energy capacity addition and more than 40,000 MW generation is targeted in XII plan. The company has developed a comprehensive master plan for integration of renewables coming up countrywide in XII plan into the grid through Green Energy Corridors at an estimated cost of about Rs. 43,000 crore.