It has identified 3349 potential sites in the country with aggregate capacity of 2852 MW for SHPs up to 3 MW capacity and 662 identified sites with aggregate capacity of 5519 MW for SHPs of three to 15 MW capacity. With the recent order of the government that hydro-power projects up to 25 MW be treated as SHPs, the ministry is busy identifying the potential sites for these projects.

So far, 271 small hydro power projects in 25 states aggregating to 216.97 MW have been completed and 131 projects in 23 states aggregating to 133.18 MW are under implementation. The government has so far given incentives for detail survey and investigation and detail project report preparation for 242 sites.

Zonal plan under the UNDP-GEF technical assistance scheme has already been undertaken for 13 states, namely Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Bihar, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir, Manipur, Mizoram, Nagaland, Sikkim, Meghalaya, Tripura, UP and West Bengal. As a result, 2162 potential sites aggregating to 3827 MW have been identified. The execution of 17 such projects has already started.

The prototype models of multi-purpose power units (MPPU) for water mills have been developed in UP, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir and Arunachal Pradesh. Hundred demonstration water mills including two for power generation as designed by AHEC, Roorkee have been installed and are being monitored for their performance. MNES has announced a scheme to support water mills up to Rs 60,000. These 13 states have announced attractive policies for private sector participation and policies on wheeling, banking and buy-back of energy generation. the ministry of non-conventional energy sources has insisted that evacuation of power from SHPs should be the responsibilities of state electricity boards.

Sites with a potential of over 1900 MW have been offered so far by these states for commercial projects. The ministry has also taken up the case of renovation and modernisation of old SHP projects.

It has approved the grant for renovation of Jali (6x350 KW) and Rongnichu II (5x500 KW) SHPs in Sikkim, Rinchington (2x1000 KW) and Little Ranjit (2x1000 KW) in West Bengal and Nogli (2x250 & 4x500 KW) in Himachal Pradesh. This renovation and modernisation scheme has been recently extended to cover old SHPs up to 15 MW capacity.