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JK yet to prepare draft for Solar City project
6/26/2016 11:16:26 PM
Saqib Junaid
Early Times Report
SRINAGAR, June 26: At a time when the state is suffering for want of power as it has to purchase electricity worth hundreds of crores annually from the Centre owned NHPC and other power corporations, the state Government is yet to prepare the preliminary draft for the Solar City that was approved by the government of India in 2015.
As per a study conducted by the National Institute of Solar Energy (NISE), Jammu and Kashmir has solar power potential of 111.05 GWp, the second highest in India after Rajasthan, which has the potential of 142 GWp.
While majority of the states have prepared and submitted their Master plan Draft regarding setting up of the solar city, Jammu and Kashmir is yet to start working on it.
The Ministry for Renewable Energy and Resources in its recently released status on the solar city projects has mentioned J&K among the least performing state.
The Union Ministry last year had announced developing 55 solar cities across India including one in Jammu and Kashmir.
In Jammu and Kashmir, the first solar city would come up in Leh which is aimed to harness the solar energy to mitigate the energy crisis in the region.
Sources said the Centre had also decided to build the world's largest solar power project in Ladakh to generate 5,000 megawatts of power, which requires 20,000 acres of land. "But there has been no headway in setting up the project due to the non seriousness of state govt towards solar energy," sources said.
A senior official at State Renewable Energy Development said admitted that there has been delay in preparing the proposal due to some major reasons.
"The work has not started yet as we have recently applied for the solar city development. First of all we will have to submit the proposal and then we will engage consultants in framing the master plan for the project. The funds have not been released yet and the project will take some time," he said.
According to sources keeping in view the the power crisis within the state, the Centre has time to time sanctioned several solar power projects to J&K but state govt has failed to bear positive results from these projects.
The union government in 2010 launched the Jawaharlal Nehru National Solar Mission (JNNSM) with the objective of promoting generation of green and clean power by using solar energy and to provide hassle-free electricity with zero emission in the state. However, the govt failed to submit the detailed report in this regard and the project never saw daylight.
The Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) had launched "Development of Solar Cities" mission in February 2008 which later was modified /revised vide no. 5/4/2013-14/SC in January 2014.
A total of 55 cities/towns were proposed to be supported for development as "Solar/ Green Cities". At least one city in each State to a maximum of seven cities in a State may be supported by the Ministry. The cities should have population between 5 to 50 lakh.
But state government has also failed in implementing the project due to the reasons best known to them.
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