Energy body to examine status of power projects

The Energy Co-ordination Committee is expected to meet shortly to discuss issues such as the shelf of power generation projects to be offered to potential investors, state governments re-visiting power purchase agreements signed in the past, and the status of co-financed power projects through the inter institutional group (IIG) mechanism, among others.

This is being done to deal with the concerns in the power sector raised in the note submitted by Finance Minister P Chidambaram.

In order to ascertain the progress made in the development of the ambitious ultra mega power projects, the finance ministry will also shortly call a review meeting of these projects, each of which is 4,000 Mw.

"Finance Minister P Chidambaram will call a meeting to review the status of the ultra mega projects. Power Secretary RV Shahi will co-ordinate this meeting after consulting the finance minister," a government official told Business Standard.

The Planning Commission has also been asked to make a presentation on issues such as actual achievement in the installment of power generation capacity in the ninth Plan period (2002-07) and shelf of power generation projects. The presentations will be made on the subject after consulting the power ministry.

"Concerns were raised about the projects co-financed through the IIG mechanism being in jeopardy. This exercise is also being conducted to ascertain whether the country has a shelf of hydel and thermal projects including normal, mega and ultra-mega projects that can draw potential investors," he added.

These decisions were taken after Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's recent meeting with Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia and Finance Minister P Chidambaram on the next level of economic reforms.