Tender for mega offshore wind park in Gujarat soon.

The Union Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) will issue the tender for the country’s first mega offshore wind farm with a capacity of 1 gigawatt (GW) in Gujarat within a month.

“The location for the first mega offshore wind energy park has already been identified. We will come out with a tender in a month’s time,” said Anand Kumar, Secretary, MNRE, during a presentation at the Vibrant Gujarat Global Summit in Gandhinagar on Sunday.

State-run Solar Energy Corporation of India has been given the responsibility of the auction plan. The plan was announced in December 2017, followed by an announcement of Expression of Interest (EoI) in June-July 2018. The MNRE was to design and prepare the main tender document after discussions with participating companies of EoIs.

Some of the global majors who had submitted EoIs are Danish, Orsted, Copenhagen Infrastructure partners, UK’s Innogy Renewable, US-based Deep Water Structures, Equinor from Norway, Italian Saipem and Park Wind from Belgium.

Among the Indian players, Torrent, Inox Wind, Suzlon, Shell India, CLP, Sterlite, Greenko and others have submitted their EoIs.

Kumar further stated that there is a potential to generate 302 GW of energy through offshore wind.

At a seminar on ‘Renewable Energy: Opportunities in Gujarat and India’, Kumar said the Centre is ambitious about ensuring faster growth in the renewable energy sector.

The share of renewable in overall energy generation in India, which was 2 per cent in 2010, has increased to 20 per cent in 2018. “We expect that by 2020, the share of renewables will increase to 22 per cent,” he said.

“During the year 2017, we have seen 8.9 per cent growth in the renewable sector. We are now moving from clean energy to green energy. Our target is to reduce carbon emissions by 30-35 per cent,” Kumar said.

India, which currently has total renewable installed capacity of 75 GW, aims to reach 175 GW by March 2022.

Calling for a reasonable rates for sustainability of renewable sector, Kumar said “We have a prepared a detailed plan for the growth of renewable energy in the country. We are also looking to enhance the ease of doing business to facilitate investment in the sector. But what we expect from the industry is fair and reasonable rates, which is important for sustainability.”

HBL