The people of Himachal Pradesh can have access to the new and clean renewable source of energy in the form of Solar Photovoltaic lights (SPV) at 70 per cent subsidy as per the guidelines of the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE), Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh said on Saturday.
Presiding over the meeting of governing body of HIMURJA here, he said that the people opting for grid connected roof top solar panels/power plant were being given 70 per cent subsidy and the surplus power could be further sold to HPSEBl at the rate of `5 per unit, which would also add to the income of the individual besides using the free solar power.
To empower the people in remote and rural areas of the State with 24x7 power by way of centralised solar power supply, HIMRUJA under the general scheme for individuals would provide 1 kWp each upto 168 kWp initially. So far 46 supply orders had been placed in addition for tribal areas, he said.
The Chief Minister said though 100 per cent of electrification had been achieved by the State yet there were few off-shore habitations in remote and tribal areas which were facing low voltage problem and untimely disruptions. The solar power was the only alternate for electrification of these left-out hamlets which will provide un-interrupted power through decentralised solar photovoltaic applications.
Singh said that apart from hydel-generation, which though was a costly affair, HIMURJA had commissioned 10 hydel projects in remote and tribal areas of the state with capacity ranging between 100 Kilowatt (KW) to 5 Mega Watt(MW). He said that unlike hydel, the solar energy was more perennial and equally distributed across the State and it was prudent to have an energy mix rather than single source and hence coal and gas based sources should be substituted with clean and renewable sources for reliability and security.
The CM said that two solar cities were being developed in the State at Shimla and Hamirpur. Final master plan for development of Shimla and Hamirpur cities as solar cities had been approved by MNRE, Government of India. Under the project 15 kWp Power plant had been commissioned at Panchayat Bhawan and 20 kWp at Old Bus stand in Shimla. To install 20 kWp Solar power plant at the Ridge, approval was awaited from Heritage Committee and 1790 SPV home lights for slums around Shimla were in process of distribution.
Apart from this, efforts were afoot to install wind energy plants in Dalsah in Kullu, Bharmour in Chamba, Arsu in Kullu, Dalhousie in Chamba, at Kalp, Moorang and Pooh in Kinnaur, Kaza, Keylong, lingti in lahaul and Spiti, Dharamsala in district Kangra and Chopal in Shimla district, he added.
Virbhadra Singh said that under Solar Thermal Extension Programme, solar water heating system, solar cookers and concentrated solar heath technology based cooking system were being propagated and provided to the potential beneficiaries. Under this programme 37285 box type solar cookers and, 761 dish type solar cookers were distributed to the beneficiaries.
Agriculture and MPP Minister, Sujan Singh Pathania, MlA, Ajay Mahajan, Chief Secretary, P Mitra, Chief Executive Officer HIMURJA, Bhanu Pratap Singh, Director, HIMURJA, Kl Thakur, and others were present.