May 25, 2014

Sterlite Technologies Limited announced that Sterlite Grid Limited has been awarded its sixth ultra-mega transmission project (UMTP) on build-own-operate basis by the Ministry of Power, Government of India. This Northern Region Strengthening Scheme project (NRSS 29) is a part of the National Grid and is designed to carry over 1000 MWs of electricity from Punjab to the Kashmir Valley.

The Kashmir Valley has been troubled by frequent blackouts on account of unavailability of sufficient power. These blackouts occur mostly during the winter months thereby having a severe impact on the lives of Valley residents. The NRSS 29 project was conceived by the Central Electricity Authority to provide a direct link between Punjab and the valley region. A new route was specifically chosen to ensure the line has minimum outages. Post-construction, Sterlite Grid will be responsible to ensure that the link is active for 98 per cent of the year.

The project consists of one substation and 800 circuit kilometers of 400kV lines in the states of Punjab and J&K. Sterlite Grid has quoted an annual tariff of approximately Rs 440 crores per year, which is 5 per cent lower than the next highest bid. This will be Sterlite Grid’s largest project in terms of revenues and scale.