To meet the additional expenditure required to adhere to the environmental norms for thermal power plants, the states have sought access to the Centre-operated Power System Development Fund and the National Clean Energy Fund. According to sources, many states have demanded that the capital expenditure on this account should be passed on as grants and not considered as loans. The issues were raised at the conference of power ministers of states recently held at Gurgaon.
According to the ministry of environment and forests’ (MoEF) mandate, 1,61,402 mega watt (MW) power generation capacity would have to install flue gas de-sulphurisation (FGD) units and 64,525 MW capacity will have to be upgraded with electrostatic precipitators to reduce emissions. The estimated capex to install the emission reducing equipment are in the range of Rs 88 lakh to Rs 128 lakh for every MW. This is expected to raise power tariffs by Rs 0.62-0.93/unit.
