Eulogising the benefits of Uday scheme for distribution firms, Power and Coal Minister Piyush Goyal today said states have floated bonds worth Rs 1 lakh crore under the scheme in just two-and-a-half months.
Uday is the most comprehensive assessment for the power sector, he said adding it is a bottoms-up approach, which is why every state has almost accepted it and the rest will come in line after elections.
The concept has also found resonance across political parties despite being voluntary, Goyal said at industry body CII's annual session here.
"It will result in Rs 1.80 lakh crore in saving every year and you will be delighted to know that we have been able to place Rs 1 lakh crore of Uday bonds by March 31 within a short span of two-and-a-half months," the minister noted.
This will bring down the interest costs of the discoms by a significant level and therefore keep power tariffs at least at the level they are now rather then going up, he said.
Under Uday, 10 states have signed MoUs till date. The combined discom debt that would be restructured in respect of these states is around Rs 1.96 lakh crore, which is about 45 percent of the total outstanding discom debt of Rs 4.3 lakh crore as on September 30, 2015.
On solar projects, he said tenders for 21 GW are out and by April or May this year they will be awarded with a Power Purchase Agreement (PPA).
On power transmission, the minister said tenders worth Rs 40-45 thousand crore are out for developers and another Rs 50 thousand crore through TGCIL, Power Grid for contracting. So, overall about Rs 1 lakh crore of power transmission projects came out into the market in the last fiscal.
On wind power generation, Goyal said the country added 3,200 MW of wind power, the highest ever added in many years, particularly in the last 5-6 years.
Power Grid commissioned projects with a 39 percent growth last fiscal, so almost Rs 30,000 crore projects got commissioned over 24,000 circuit kms.
On Coal India, the minister said India made an addition of 42 million tonnes in a fiscal, the highest ever addition to coal production.
"From 494 million tonnes production we moved up to 536 million tonnes by Coal India Ltd (CIL) alone. And in the two years since the present government came in, we added about 74 million tonnes," he noted.
The minister said coal is now in excess and the government is looking at avenues to sell it.
He added that Coal Ministry is talking to Railways to work out a strategy to move excess coal to places where it is required and try to cut down on imports.
Speaking on the International Solar Alliance (ISA), Goyal said the concept was articulated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and was launched on the sidelines of the COP 21 in Paris.
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