Floating PV driving Odisha solar development

• The state, which is intending to hit 2.2 GW of solar within two years, has actually gotten a Solar Energy Corporation of India proposal for 500 MW of floating project capacity also as it accepts a 40 MW water-borne range advanced by the nationwide solar body. The 500 MW suggested comes on top of a similar scale of floating PV planned throughout the state by public hydropower company NHPC.

The Solar Energy Corporation of India (SECI) has actually sent out the state government of Odisha a proposition for establishing 500 MW of floating solar generation ability at the Hirakud tank.

The national solar body has currently had the green light from state authorities for the construction of 40 MW of floating ability at the Chiplima hydropower center.

SECI's new proposition follows an agreement in July by state-owned hydropower company NHPC as well as its Green Energy Development Corporation of Odisha Limited (GEDCOL) subsidiary to establish 500 MW of floating PV project capacity, in 50 MW arrays on tanks.

GEDCOL chief taking care of supervisor Bishnupada Sethi said, at the time of the agreement, floating PV could be a video game changer in Odisha as the state has limited access to non-forest, non-agricultural land for traditional solar projects. "The floating solar projects have an inherent benefit of preservation of land and also the associated price to acquire as well as preserve the site," claimed Sethi. "Other advantages include a reduction of temperature-related [energy yield] losses as a result of [the] cooling effect [on panels mounted above water] and [a] decrease of water dissipation."

Odisha, which has just 362 MW of solar generation capability today, will require a huge initiative to hit the solar target it put down in 2016, which required 2.2 GW of generation ability by 2022.