| State energy minister Mohammed Ali Shabbir said on Wednesday that his department would soon submit a report on location and land availability for the proposed second UMPP to the energy ministry. |
| "While certain clearances are still pending for the Mundra and Sasan UMPPs, the state officials have secured all the 69 clearances for the 4,000-Mw Krishnapatnam in a short time. We expect that the Krishnapatnam facility would become the first UMPP to be commissioned in the country," he told the media. |
| He also said that the energy ministry had offered to allocate 50 per cent of the power from the second UMPP as compared with the 40 per cent allocation, about 1,600 Mw, in the Krishnapatnam UMPP to the state. |
| "Reliance Energy officials have indicated to us that the company would soon start work on the project," he said. The Krishnapatnam UMPP was awarded to Reliance Energy recently. |
| The UMPP requires about 1,000 acres of land apart from the provision of water. Moreover, the project needs to be located near a port as it would run on imported coal. The state government is considering the port towns of Machilipatnam and Kakinada as one of the possible locations. |
| The state government is eager to provide land and other support for the second UMPP since it would further augment the power supply in the state, which has been witnessing an ever-growing demand for power. |
| On Tuesday, the state power utilities were able to meet the additional demand of 1,100 Mw by handling a peak load of 7,900 Mw, as compared with 6,800 Mw on the same day last year. |
| Still, a 4.4 per cent shortage in the ensuing rabi has been projected even after taking into consideration the additional power purchases and part utilisation of idle capacity in gas power projects by using naphtha and high-speed diesel, which works out at Rs 8.62 per unit and Rs 7.50 per unit respectively, according to the minister. |
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