19 December, 2011

The Union Government is planning to provide financial assistance to state governments to set up transmission networks to evacuate renewable energy generated in the states, a senior government official said.

“Renewable power generation capacity in the country is enormous. But the issue is of evacuation. We plan to provide some assistance to state governments in setting up transmission network,” Joint Secretary of Ministry of New and Renewable Energy Tarun Kapoor told reporters on the sidelines of a conference.

“We will be coming up with a scheme for providing funds or some kind of subsidies to state governments to build their transmission infrastructure,” he said.

The government is planning to set up five new power transmission lines in Tamil Nadu, with private sector participation at an estimated cost of Rs 6,485 crore.

“We are also getting requests from states like Rajasthan, Himachal Pradesh, Gujarat and Karnataka for supporting them to lay transmission networks. We are evaluating a scheme and a decision on the same will soon be taken,” he said.

Kapoor also said that the government will increase its budgetary provision for encouraging renewable energy generation in the country. “In the current fiscal, we had made a provision of Rs 1,200 crore for renewable energy generation. In the next fiscal, we will enhance it further,” he said.

“At present, the total installed wind power capacity is over 15,000 MW and we aim to double it in the next five years. We had earlier estimated a potential capacity of 49,000 MW of wind energy. But, we have realised that there is a huge potential than the estimated. Therefore, we will be reassessing the potential wind power generation capacity and take steps accordingly,” Kapoor said.