The Hindu : Other States News : Himachal begins work on major hydel project

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Monday, Jun 20, 2005

Other States

Other States

Himachal begins work on major hydel project

Staff Correspondent

SHIMLA: The Himachal Chief Minister, Virbhadra Singh, on Sunday laid the foundation stone for the 110 MW Sawra-Kuddu hydro electric project on the Pabbar river, a tributary of Satluj. The project would be executed by the Pabbar Valley Power Corporation, a subsidiary of Himachal Pradesh State Electricity Board.

Besides Sawra-Kuddu, another 46 MW Chirgaon-Majhgon and 70 MW Dhamwari-Sunda projects are also under active consideration and will be allotted to the State Electricity Board. The Sawra-Kuddu project would be completed in the next five years at a cost of Rs 648 crores.

The Chief Minister said that of the 84,000 MW hydel potential of the country, the State has about 22,000 MW, which was being exploited with the environmental safeguards to the optimum. He said that 6060 MW hydel potential had so far been harnessed while work on various projects having generation capacity of 4380 MW was in progress.

Hydel power potential

He said efforts were afoot to harness the remaining hydel potential expeditiously which would meet the power needs of the northern States to a great extent. He said the State Government had targeted harnessing of over 8000 MW hydel power in the next three-four years.

Mr. Singh said the previous Government had failed to protect the interests of the State in the 2051 MW Parvati Valley Project being executed by National Hydro Power Corporation and 800 MW Kol Dam project being executed by National Thermal Power Corporation where equity participation of the State was not ensured thereby causing immense loss to the State exchequer.

He said the Government had taken up the matter with the Centre to review the decision so as to ensure equity participation of the State Government in both the projects.

State Power Minister Vidya Stokes said the Sawara-Kuddu project was one of the ambitious projects being executed by the State Electricity Board. She said the State Government had decided to allocate mini and micro Hydel projects of 1 MW to 5 MW capacities to the small entrepreneurs, so that they could also participate in the hydel potential exploitation process. She said the State would ensure environmental safeguards while generating hydro power.

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Himachal begins work on major hydel project