During the past nine years, the government has allocated approximately Rs 20 lakh crores towards the power sector, with plans to invest an additional Rs 17 lakh crores over the next five to seven years, according to Union Minister for Power and New & Renewable Energy, R. K. Singh. Addressing a media gathering, the minister highlighted the rapid expansion of the power sector, generating substantial demand. The government aims for this demand to be fulfilled by domestically manufactured products, necessitating a significant manufacturing capacity .
"We have already put in place policy instruments, such as a tariff barrier of 40 percent on solar modules, and a barrier of 25 percent on cells so that industry is protected. We have put quality barriers so that externally manufactured equipment takes time to qualify. Today, our module manufacturing capacity has gone up from 20 GW to 50 GW, and cell manufacturing capacity from 2 GW to around 12 – 13 GW", the Power Minister R. K. Singh said.
He said that in the last 10 years, the government has added 190 GW of power generation capacity, increasing it to around 436 GW, nearly doubling it. "This required a lot of thermal and renewable equipment. We added 200,000 circuit kilometers to transmission lines; our transmission system today is the largest integrated transmission system in the world", the Power Minister R. K. Singh said.
"We can transfer 116 GW from one corner of the country to another. During my tenure, we spent about Rs 2 lakh crores in constructing about 3,000 new substations, upgrading about 4,000 substations, adding 8.5 lakh circuit kilometers of HT and LT lines and 7.5 lakh transformers," he pointed out.
According to the Power Minister, ongoing expansion in the power sector indicates the necessity of doubling its size by 2030, considering the substantial amount of power required. "The power demand grew by 60 percent from 2013-14, and it grew by 9 percent last year, but we were able to meet it due to the expansion and upgradation in infrastructure. We are adding about 85 GW of thermal capacity and have 14 GW of hydro under construction. Another 14-15 GW of hydro capacity is under clearances," the Power Minister R. K. Singh said.
He said that the Indian industry needs to look around to compete in external markets and be able to export. "The quality of products needs to be so good that they can compete globally, and their prices need to be reasonable. You have to compete and the people are not going to suffer while you give them outdated or bad-quality equipment or high prices", the Power Minister R. K. Singh said.
The Union Minister added that the government is also open to people coming and setting up industry in India. "We want manufacturing to come here. The world is looking at China plus one and we want to be that one," the Power Minister R. K. Singh said. He pointed out that the nation is going to add thermal capacity since we are not going to compromise on the availability of power for growth.
Source : IANS