Continuing its effort to promote the use of renewable energy, the South East Central Railway (SECR) Raipur division has installed solar panels at level-crossings existing in remote pockets of the division.
Under this move, Railways has initially equipped as many as nine cottages of manned level-crossing with solar panels and its extension will be carried out shortly, said Public Relation Officer (PRO) Raipur Division Ratan Basak, adding that several administrative buildings and offices of Railways under the division are already equipped with solar panels.
Basak further said that power generated by the solar panels has brought down the power consumption at these level-crossings by upto 60 percent.
The power generated by these solar panels are being utilised for lighting, phone recharging and others purpose. The estimated cost of installing solar panels at level crossing is around Rs 20000 and it generates around 150 units of electricity. With minimum maintenance, these solar panels last for several years ranging for 15 to 20 years.