NTPC expedites work to commission India’s biggest floating solar power plant of 100 MW capacity at Ramagundam in Telangana.
The coal mining firm, Singareni Collieries Company, located close by, is also planning a 300 MW floating solar plant at Maniar dam.
NTPC is focusing on renewable energy and as a part of this, it is constructing a 100 MW floating solar photovoltaic project at Ramagundam on a 450 acre water body of the 800 acre reservoir.
The reservoirs on Godavari river have huge potential as this bypasses the requirement of land acquisition for solar project. The company has received interest for a similar project on Narmada and enquiries from abroad.
The project worth Rs 423 crore, being executed by BHEL, will see supply of about 40 MW of merchant power from September 2021 and all of 100 MW before the end of 2021. The project got delayed due to COVID-19 lockdown and supply disruptions.
The company is setting up two other floating solar projects in south at Simhadri plant of 25 MW and Kayamkulam plant of 92 MW.
NTPC has become India’s first energy company to declare its energy compact goals as part of the UN High-level Dialogue on Energy and is looking to install 60 GW of renewable energy capacity by 2032.
It is also evaluating battery back-up for round-the-clock power and another project on the reservoir at Ramagundam, which can potentially have a capacity of 120 MW, with more advanced modules.
The project will be one of the largest single location floating solar projects on natural reservoir with water from Sri Ram Sagar project on Godavari river.
The project will have 40 2.5 MW arrays of solar blocks with each array having about 12,000 solar PV panels along with one set of transformer, inverter and switch gear panel. The project will have 4,70,000 solar panels with over 10 lakh pieces of HDPE floats.
The unique feature of the project is that all components, including transformer, inverter and switch gear panels, will be afloat on a cement cast platform. A 33 kV underground cabling system measuring 2.5 km will be laid for power evacuation from the reservoir to 400 kV switch yard.
