India to set up world’s largest solar power plant of 750 MW capacity
A week ago India commissioned world’s first 100% solar power airport in Cochi.Now, India has announced to build world’s largest solar powered plant in Madhya Pradesh.
The 750 megawatts (MW) station will be set in Rewa district in an area over 1,500 hectares. State’s energy minister Rajendra Shukla hopes that the plant will be commissioned in 2017 if everything went well.
Rewa Ultra Mega Solar project will be established by a joint venture of Solar Energy Corporation of India and MP Urja Vikas Nigham. Both firms have 50% stake in the project. A barren government land has been chosen for the project.
According to Shukla, one MW solar energy generation will require two hectares of land and will cost approximately Rs. 7.6 crores. The solar power plant will beat 392 MW Ivanpah Solar Power Facility at Mojave deserts in California.
Last year, Narendra Modi had inaugurated Asia’s largest project at Neemuch at a cost of approx. Rs 1,100 crore on 305 hectares of land.
India had announced its ambitious target of achieving 100 GW solar power capacity by 2022 at a cost of $200 billion. According to a report from the Institute for energy Economics and Financial Analysis, India’s solar capacity can deliver 22 percent or 110 terawatt-hours of required power increase within seven years.
According to Tim Buckley, director of energy finance studies at IEEFA, “India is replicating Germany’s and China’s systematic electricity sector transformation, with the added advantage that the cost effectiveness of this is accentuated by the fact that the price of solar electricity has dropped by 80 percent in five years.”
India has also left behind China’s 200 MW capacity Delingha plant planned in over 25 square kilometers.
