Offshore Wind Developers To Get Seabed Area On Lease For Five Years

The Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) has issued norms for the tenders for allocating seabed to develop offshore wind projects. It comes when the ministry has proposed to hold bids for the allocation of offshore wind sites off the coast of Tamil Nadu. 

As per the norms, the National Institute of Wind Energy (NIWE) would facilitate the Stage-I and Stage-II clearances from various central and state authorities. It also said that the grid evacuation infrastructure for these offshore substations would be provided as part of the ISTS network of Central Transmission Utility (CTU) or PGCIL. 

The document also talked about the bidding process. “The bid will be based on single stage two envelope wherein the first envelope will be the techno-commercial bid and the second envelope will be the financial bid wherein the bidder quotes the site lease rental with a minimum floor price @ Rs. 1 Lakh/sq km/year,” it read.

It also said that leasing the seabed area to the developer would be initially for five years and could be extended for one more year. It also empowers the developer to exit the project development during these five years of leave period. It will be subjected to submission of the study/survey date to NIWE and forfeiture of the submitted bank guarantee, which will be USD 1 million for a site. 

The MNRE norms said that post-commissioning of the project, the lease will be extended for the project’s operational life and decommissioning period. It also mandated the developers to pay the seabed lease floor price at the rate of Rs 1 lakh/sq-km annually for the remaining operational period from the date of commissioning.  

“In order to have necessary preparedness towards participating in the above bids for allocation of offshore wind sites, interested developers may carry out their own required study/survey on these sites after informing NIWE. NIWE will extend all the support to facilitate the study/survey activities as per the Guidelines for Wind Power Assessment, Studies and Surveys,” the norms read.