Scatec India, O2 Power And SJVN Emerge Winners From SECI’s 1.2GW Wind Tender

The year end has brought glad news for Scatec India, SJVN and O2 Power, as the three firms emerged with the only allotments from SECI’s 1.2 GW wind energy tender (Tranche XIII) issued in January this year. In terms of actual bids, SJVN was the lowest bidder, having quoted Rs 2.90/unit for a 100 MW bid. Scatec India (300 MW) and O2 Power (200 MW) made their bids at Rs 2.95/unit. That means, SECI has allotted only 600 MW of the 1200 MW tender for now.

The ISTN connected offer for developers came with a condition of winning bids not being beyond L1+2%, that ruled out the next few bidders in the final list, starting with Solarcraft Power with a bid at Rs 3.17, and many other bidders going upto bids at Rs 3.42/unit. For SJVN, the latest win continues a recent winning trend, with perhaps assured land access at lower rates the advantage it has had in bidding at very competitive levels.

The winning bids continue the trend of final bid prices seen in earlier tenders during the year by staying below Rs 3 per unit. Under it’s last Tranche XII wind energy tender, NTPC had emerged as the lowest bidder at Rs 2.89/unit.

The tender comes with the now standard conditions of the need to comply with the sourcing turbines from the ‘Revised list of modules and manufacturers’ (RLMM) issued by the MNRE, the onus on the developers to acquire land and maintaining generation of 80-120% annual CUF for the 25 year duration of the PPAs with SECI.

Going ahead, it is increasingly expected that large, pure play wind energy tenders may stay uncommon, as SECI, and other agencies push for large, Hybrid projects involving solar and wind with storage even. The trend has started this year, and is expected to pick up pace going ahead. Wind energy in such cases was being used to drive up overall CUF for such projects, effectively managing its limitation of higher costs vis a vis equivalent solar capacity. However, with the recent trend on solar prices, even that logic might come up for questioning sooner than later one believes.