Punjab Government on Tuesday dedicated 11.5 megawatt single rooftop solar power plant to the nation at Dera Baba Jaimal Singh, popularly known as Radha Soami sect headquarters at Beas.
Rs 139 crore project, which the Government claimed to be world’s largest single rooftop solar power plant, is spread over 82 acres of rooftop in single campus on multiple roofs with installed capacity of 19.5 MW.
The plant, built by Radha Soami Satsang Beas (RSSB), will generate nearly 150 lakh units annually and is expected to offset 19,000 tonnes of carbon emissions annually.
Extremely delighted over the installation of eco-friendly solar project in Punjab, Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal appreciated the rare feat of Punjab Energy Development Agency (PEDA) to usher in a solar power revolution in the State.
He said that Punjab’s immense contribution to tap enormous power potential from various renewable energy resources was evident from the fact that the Prime Minister Narendra Modi awarded Punjab for being one of the best performing States for capacity addition of Solar Energy during Re-Invest-2015.
Badal, along with the state New and Renewable Energy Resources Minister Bikram Singh Majithia, lauded the sect management for setting up the solar plant. “This State-of-the-art project installed by the Radha Soami Satsang Beas Educational and Environmental Society (RSSBEES) with technical collaboration of PEDA would go a long way to motivate other states for replication of such projects to provide clean and green energy to the consumers,” he said.
Majithia said that the State Government was focusing on setting up solar energy plants across the state. “This project, with enormous environmental friendly benefits, would be instrumental in abatement of four lakh tonnes of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the next 25 years, which is equivalent to planting nearly two lakh trees,” he said.
He said that this project would generate clean and green energy sufficient to power approximately 8000 homes. Besides, this project would also go a long way in creating awareness about eco-friendly solar power amongst general public as one crore devotees visits the Dera annually, he added.
Majithia pointed out that Centre has set a target of power generation of 40,000 MW from different resources of renewable energy to be achieved by 2022 and this project would be a role model to encourage other states to replicate such large rooftops on the building or sheds. Punjab would achieve a target of 2552 MW of renewable energy generation by 2022, he added.
The State Government had recently claimed that the State had set a national benchmark in solar power generation with a 172 times increase in just three years. Investment in the solar power sector increased from Rs 70 crore to over Rs 12,000 crore in 2015, it was claimed.