India plans to revive 24,000 MW gas plant |
Indian government is working on a scheme to salvage 24,000 MW of stressed gas ¬based power plants, built at an investment of over Rs 1 lakh crore, by importing natural gas and bundling the output with cheaper solar energy. The power and petroleum ministries are working on the new proposal. The earlier scheme entailing subsidy has been shelved. The proposed new scheme will offer no subsidy and hopes to help operate the power stations at 90% capacity by selling the bundled power. According to sources, the earlier proposed gasified liquid natural gas scheme (e¬RLNG), which involved an e-¬auction, was successful when there was electricity shortage in the country. In the later tranches, the scheme did not garner much interest from the developers. Bundling of solar power with an equal amount of gas¬ based power is expected to result in lower cost of production than blending domestic and imported gas-¬based power. Power Trading Corp of India has been asked to work on the proposal. The gas is proposed to be imported by GAIL India with concessions and haircuts by central and state governments, power companies and gas transporters to make it affordable. The proposed concessions include waiver of state and central taxes on imported LNG, waiver of GST on regasification and transportation of the fuel, reduction of pipeline tariff charges and marketing margin by GAIL.
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