Aditya Birla Renewables To Setup 75 MW Solar Plant In Odisha

Bhubaneswar: Aditya Birla Renewables Ltd has signed a long-term power purchase agreement (PPA) with state power distributor Gridco for developing 75 Mw solar power plant in the state.

A tender was floated by Gridco to install a 75 MW solar power plant and the company won it with the lowest bid value of Rs 2.79 per unit.

Aditya Birla Renewables will get 9 months to finalise the land, and this project will need 375 acres. If contiguous land is not available, then the project will be set up at different locations. The company is discussing the same with Odisha Industrial Infrastructure Development Corporation (Idco).

Gridco will buy power from the plant for 25 years.

Last July, Odisha had floated its first ever solar auction for 200 MW. Only L1 category bidder, Aditya Birla Renewables oversubscribed the bid 4 times while L2 players such as Sukhbir Agro Energy Ltd, Gupta Power Infrastructure Ltd and Eden Renewable Varenne Pvt Ltd bagged 25 MW, 20 MW and 50 MW at Rs 3.19 per unit. In the L3 category, Acme Solar quoted Rs 3.20 per unit for 50 MW plant.

Gridco had to cancel the 125 MW as the L2 and L3 bidders couldn’t scale the price down to L1 level bidder.

According to sources, Gridco is constrained to commit to long-term PPAs where tariff exceeds Rs 3 per unit.

Gridco had signed up a power sales agreement with Solar Electrification Corporation of India (SECI) in August 2018 that will let it buy 300 MW at Rs 2.72 per unit when it is fed to the state grid in 2019-20 end. Gridco will not have to pay transmission charges, according to the agreement with SECI.