Govt invites proposals from land owners
LUCKNOW: Land owners in Uttar Pradesh can now sell or lease out their land to the government for setting up of solar PV (photovoltaic) projects for the purpose of solarisation of agriculture feeders in the state, an official dealing with the issue said. Solar PV produces electricity from solar energy directly.
Solar Energy Corporation of India Limited (SECI), a Central government enterprise that the Uttar Pradesh government has appointed the implementing agency in the state, has invited expression of interest (EOI) from interested land owners/ prospective aggregators in this regard.
“The land owners willing to sell or lease out their land for the setting up of solar projects required to solarise segregated agri feeders can submit their proposals by October 7 after which the proposals will be shortlisted for technical and financial evaluations before the deal is finalised between the two parties,” the official said.
As per the requirements laid out by SECI, the applicants will be empanelled to provide their land to solar power developers on lease/ sale basis and in case of lease, the tenure for lease will be 30 years from the date of signing of lease agreement.
“However, the land should not be less than four acres and must have an access to the road for movement of machinery and other material to the site,” the official pointed out.
The proposed solar PV projects are to be set up at the designated land locations in all the districts in the state. The land will be identified, leased or acquired and purchased by the selected Solar Power Developer (SPD) as per the terms and conditions mutually agreed upon.
“Depending upon the requirement, the preference will be given to land banks/parcel on the basis of cost of purchase/lease, distance to discom substation, etc,” he said. “The purpose of inviting this EOI is to identify the applicants who are interested in leasing/sale of their land for setting up of solar power plants in the state,” he added.
As per EOI, in case any successful solar power developer, as selected by SECI, is willing to purchase/lease out land for its project, it may contact any of the empanelled land owners/ aggregators for further process of land acquisition. The selected developers will require either to purchase the land outright or take the same on lease though they are free to source land of their own to develop the solar projects.
The solarisation of agri feeders is part of the Central government’s new variant of PM-KUSUM (Pradhan Mantri- Kisan Urja Suraksha Evam Utthan Mahabhiyan) scheme that seeks to solarise the entire agriculture feeders instead of providing individual solar pumps to farmers who will not require to set up individual solar panels to run their water pumps.
“Once a feeder is solarised, the farmers concerned will start getting free electricity from day one and the cost of such feeders will be recovered in three years, lessening subsidy burdens on the Central and the state governments, apart from enabling farmers to get green energy,” the official pointed out.
THE PROJECTS WOULD BE UNDERTAKEN FOR THE PURPOSE OF SOLARISATION OF AGRICULTURE FEEDERS IN UP