The YSRC government has promised 9-hour uninterrupted power supply to the farm sector during day time. At present, farmers are being supplied 9 hours power in two groups.
VIJAYAWADA: The State government has decided to implement solar power projects with a capacity of 10,000 MW in the State in order to meet the agricultural consumption from renewable sources. On Monday, it issued operational guidelines for the scheme.
The YSRC government has promised 9-hour uninterrupted power supply to the farm sector during day time. At present, farmers are being supplied 9 hours power in two groups.
The annual agriculture consumption for 18.37 lakh pumps is about 12,221 MU per year as approved by APERC for FY 2020-21.
Subsidy for agriculture has almost tripled from Rs 3,186 crore in FY 2015-16 to Rs 8,354 crore in FY2020-21 due to reduction in cross subsidy from other categories and increase in cost of supply. Subsidy requirement for agriculture is expected to increase further due to increase in number of pump sets and increase in cost of supply. Subsidy support for free power supply to agriculture is likely to increase from Rs 8,900 crore in FY 2020-21 to around Rs 17,819 crore in FY 2030-31, considering release of 3 per cent new connections (55,000 – 60,000 new pump-sets) per year.
It is now proposed to replace the average power purchase cost with solar power and continue to pay the average transmission cost and average distribution cost to the discoms.The State has more than 300 sunny days a year with average solar insolation of around 5.75 kWh/m2. West Godavari, Chittoor, Kadapa, Anantapur and Kurnool are the districts with highest solar irradiation and account for more than 65% of the total agriculture consumption and have 97% of the installed solar capacity.
Considering the availability of government lands in Kadapa, Prakasam, Anantapur and Kurnool districts, solar projects are being planned there. Further, distributed solar projects may be planned in districts where government lands are not available but agricultural consumption is moderate to high, like West Godavari, Chittoor, Nellore.In order to meet the agricultural consumption, the total solar capacity requirement will be around 10,000 MW.
Source: newindianexpress
