The latest, 500 MW auction held by Gujarat Urja Vikas Vigam Ltd (GUVNL) prompted aggressive bidding, with the U.S.-based UPC Energy Group securing a 50 MW cut of the allocated capacity at the lowest tariff of Rs2.55/kWh.
The highest accepted tariff was the Rs2.68 ReNew Power quoted for 105 MW of capacity. Orange Renewable – with 120 MW; Gujarat State Electricity Corporation Ltd (75 MW), and Adani Green Energy (150 MW) won bids at Rs2.67/kWh.
The auction was oversubscribed by 545 MW as bids totalling 1,045 MW of capacity were submitted.
Last month, the Gujarat state government cancelled a 700 MW auction because of the resulting “high tariff” after the Softbank-backed SB Energy appeared to have secured some 250 MW for Rs2.84/kWh. Finland’s Fortum – pursuing 250 MW of capacity – and France’s Engie (200 MW) had quoted a price of Rs2.89.
Rollercoaster ride
Barely five months ago, a 500 MW auction in the state touched a lowest price of Rs2.44/kWh. The steep rise subsequently seen at the 700 MW procurement irked GUVNL. Developers attributed the price hike to high charges levied at the state’s Raghanesda Solar Park, where the 700 MW of projects had to be located. Previous auctions concerned projects which could be established anywhere in the state.
In its newly announced land policy, Gujarat has mandated the establishment of wind parks and areas for wind-solar hybrid projects. According to the policy, all future centrally-secured solar, wind and solar-wind hybrid projects will have to be built in such locations.
To meet the renewable purchase obligation targets of its utilities, Gujarat plans to have operational solar capacity of 5.5 GW plus an additional 1.5 GW of wind energy capacity by March 2022.
This content is protected by copyright and may not be reused. If you want to cooperate with us and would like to reuse some of our content, please contact: editors@pv-magazine.com.
By submitting this form you agree to pv magazine using your data for the purposes of publishing your comment.
Your personal data will only be disclosed or otherwise transmitted to third parties for the purposes of spam filtering or if this is necessary for technical maintenance of the website. Any other transfer to third parties will not take place unless this is justified on the basis of applicable data protection regulations or if pv magazine is legally obliged to do so.
You may revoke this consent at any time with effect for the future, in which case your personal data will be deleted immediately. Otherwise, your data will be deleted if pv magazine has processed your request or the purpose of data storage is fulfilled.
Further information on data privacy can be found in our Data Protection Policy.