Chennai:
SunEdison, one of the largest global renewable energy
development company will develop two Giga watts (GW) of wind and solar power in
the state in the next five years.
Talking to reporters, Pasupathy Gopalan, SunEdison’s
president of Asia-Pacific and sub-Saharan Africa said that the investment in
the next five years could work out to Rs 12,000 crore to Rs 14,000 crore.
“It will be a mix of 1.2 GW of solar and .8GW of wind
power,” said Gopalan.
He said that currently 350MW of projects are under
construction. “This include 200 MW of solar as well as 150 MW of wind energy
project (only after acquisition of Continuum Energy),” said Gopalan.
‘I can commit on the 150 MW wind power only after
acquisition of Continuum is closed,” he
said.
However, Gopalan prefers smaller solar projects to larger
ones. “One mega watt of solar power is produced using four to six acres of land.
A 50 MW solar plant would require nearly 300 acres of land so the smaller
projects have advantage,” said Gopalan.
Gopalan also stressed the need for the use of solar water
pumps in rural areas as this reduce the spending by the state government. “On
an average Rs 6,000 crore is lost due to subsidies on 20 lakh irrigation pumps.
If we can convert them into solar pumps we can be saving a lot,” he said.
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