Power-starved Punjab may witness a complete turnaround if the projections of its deputy chief minister Sukhbir Singh Badal prove correct.
In a conference organised by the Confederation of Indian Industries (northern region) on ‘Power Reforms for the north-Target 24X7 Electricity for All’ on Friday, he said Punjab would have surplus power by the end of 2013.
"We might be exporting power to other states like we export wheat and paddy. If international trade barriers are opened, we may also export power to Pakistan", said Badal.
Punjab has been in the eye of a storm due to high power tariffs and insufficient and erratic power supply.
The state lost quite a few fresh investment proposals due to bottlenecks like power shortage and high cost of land.
Badal said that land cost could not be regulated as it was purely a demand and supply equation, but the availability of power could be improved to attract industry.
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"Our 1200 Mega Watt (Mw), Larsen & Toubro thermal power project in Rajpura would be operational next year. We would upgrade it to 2,000 Mw soon. In addition two more thermal power projects — a 2,000 Mw project with Sterlite Energy Limited in Talwandi Sabo and a 1,350 Mw project with Indiabulls Power near Mansa would also be commissioned by the end of next year", he added. Punjab has a total generation capacity of 7,249 Mw and expects to add 3,920 Mw by May 2014.badal stressed that the state utilities have brought down the transmission and distribution losses from 24 per cent to 17.5 per cent and hope to bring it further down to 15 per cent. “We are also encouraging use of CFLs (compact fluorescent lamps) and renewable sources of energy like biomass and solar energy, which have immense potential in Punjab. Bio mass energy would even help farmers earn an extra income of Rs 3,000–4,000 per acre by supplying raw material," he said.
He added that the cost of power might also come down with the new technologies used in generation.
The deputy chief minister is optimistic but industries concerned as all the projects are coal-fired thermal power projects and the lack of timely and good quality coal might hamper power generation.