The Ministry of Power has fast-tracked the planning and approval process for power transmission projects, in a step towards achieving the government’s energy transition goal which focuses on renewable power.
The ministry has empowered the National Committee on Transmission (NCT) and the Central Transmission Utility (CTU) to make the changes.
To expedite approval of inter-state transmission systems (ISTS), proposals of expansion of ISTS projects up to Rs 100 crore will now be approved by CTU and proposals costing between Rs 100 crore and Rs 500 crore will be approved by NCT. The ministry will approve the proposals costing more than Rs 500 crore.
CTU, which is a part of the state-owned power transmission company, the Power Grid Corporation of India, has been hived off and will be a separate company by March-end 2022.
So far, all proposals were approved by the ministry after recommendation of NCT.
The Centre has also decided to dissolve and modify the function of the regional power committees. In the approval process of ISTS projects, two regional committees — the Regional Power Committee (RPC) and the Regional Power Committee (Transmission Planning), or RPC-TP —had to be consulted separately. This, the ministry says, delays the process.
These steps will facilitate the growth of renewable energy (RE) projects in the country. For enabling growth of RE capacity, areas which have high solar/wind energy potential need to be connected to ISTS, so that RE capacity can come up there.
The Centre will soon offer 44 new power transmission projects worth Rs 41,369 crore with most projects under the ‘Green Energy Corridors’ (GEC) plan. These projects would evacuate close to 38 GW of RE from the Western and Northern parts. Such a large scale of transmission projects under the bidding mode has been offered after a hiatus of at least three years.
Unlike conventional electricity generation, which has a long gestation period, RE generation needs close to 18 months for commissioning, while the transmission system needs 18-24 months for commissioning.
