Engineering major Larsen and Toubro (L&T) will invest around Rs 4,500 crore for setting up an additional unit of 660 mw of Rajpura Thermal Plant, chairman and managing director of L&T, AM Naik has said. The state-of-the-art 1,320-mw mega thermal plant, which will come up in Rajpura is likely to be completed by January 2014.
The plant designed, developed and operated by L&T through its subsidiary Nabha-Power Ltd will be spread over 1,080 acre in village Nalash and involve Rs 9,000-crore investment . Total power supply is around 6,000 mw against demand of 9,000 mw, leading to 33% shortage in the state
?To overcome the shortage, four new thermal power plants have been planned in the state. The work on 540-mw Goindwal Sahib and 1,980-mw Talwandi Sabo Thermal Plant is in full swing. Machinery worth Rs 1,000 crore has been ordered for Talwandi Sabo Thermal Plant and the order for the same has already been placed by the GVK group for Goindwal Sahib Plant worth Rs 500 crore?, Punjab chief minister Prakash Singh Badal told FE .
The state government has been vigorously pursuing the case for sanction of coal link with the coal ministry for 2,640-mw Giddarbaha Thermal Project and Badal has taken up the issue with PM Manmohan Singh who had assured of its clearance by March this year.
Requisite loan for the 168-mw Shahpur Kandi Project had been sanctioned by financial institutions and the project, which has been awarded national status by the Centre would be executed by the state irrigation department and completed within five years. The cost of the project was estimated at Rs 2,285 crore. The state government had also embarked upon a massive programme to generate power from non-conventional and renewable sources of energy.
He said the total generation in this sector was only 65 mw in 2007 and now 202 mw had been added by installing 29 mini bio-mass power plants, which would be further enhanced to 400 mw within the next two years.
Another 1,000 mw power generation would be tapped by establishing gas-based power plant at Ropar.