Govt Working to Bring Round-the-Clock Power Supply in J&K in 2 Years: RK Singh

The central government is aiming to provide round the clock power supply to the UT of Jammu and Kashmir (J&K), Power Minister RK Singh has said.

The Central government is aiming to provide round the clock (RTC) electricity supply to the Union territory of Jammu and Kashmir (J&K), Union Minister for Power and New and Renewable Energy RK Singh has said.

Singh and Lt. Governor Girish Chandra Murmu together chaired a high-level meeting on February 26, 2020. The modalities for strengthening the power sector in Jammu and Kashmir were discussed in the meeting. During the meeting, Singh highlighted that the mission of the Central government is to provide 24×7 power to all the districts of Jammu and Kashmir within the next two years.

He said that sufficient power is available in the country but J&K needs to address the issue by putting in place an adequate transmission and distribution system. He directed the concerned officers to prepare a project for capacity addition which could ensure round the clock power supply in the state and submit it to the Centre.

The J&K government was advised to request for further release of eligible funds under various schemes like Saubhagya, DDUGJY, IPDS, PMDP, etc. He also assured extending the project completion time of Saubhagya till June for completion of the pending work.

Earlier in January, the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) had issued a new draft policy for the supply of round-the-clock (RTC) power from renewable energy (solar, wind or small hydro) power projects. The power will be complemented with thermal power projects as and when needed.

The idea behind the implementation of the scheme is to address the biggest issue with large scale uptake of clean energy – intermittency. Solar and wind energy are not available throughout the day severely limiting their use in modern grids. To address the issues of intermittency, limited hours of supply and low capacity utilisation of transmission infrastructure, the ministry has come up with the process of reverse bundling, wherein high-cost thermal power is being allowed to be bundled with cheaper renewable energy.

“The main objective of the scheme is to provide RTC power to the Discoms through the bundling of renewable power with thermal power and to scale up renewable capacity additions. It will also facilitate fulfilment of the renewable purchase obligation (RPO) requirement of the obligated entities,” the ministry had issued.