Proposal for setting up hydel power pump storage schemes at Sinafdar, Telhar Kund, Panchgotia on river Suara and Hathiadah-Durgawati on river Durgawati in the hilly region of Bihar’s Kaimur district has been pending clearance for a long time
The Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) Member of Parliament (MP) from Sasaram Chhedi Paswan, member of Bihar legislative council (MLC) Santosh Kumar Singh and other local leaders from Bihar’s Kaimur region said they will request Central power and renewable energy minister Raj Kumar Singh to approve four long-pending hydroelectric power projects at Kaimur Hills, estimated to produce 2,570 MW of electricity, when Singh visits Bihar for two days in connection with the party’s Jan Ashrivad Yatra programme.
“I had visited all the four sites and worked hard since the 1990s for moving the state government for the construction of hydel projects to change the fate of poor tribal and scheduled caste people on Kaimur hills. It is a good omen that the Union power minister is coming here. The issue will be strongly raised before him by the elected representatives of the region,” MP Paswan said.
Paswan was referring to the Bihar State Hydroelectric Power Corporation’s (BHPC) proposal for setting up hydel power pump storage schemes at Sinafdar (345MW), Telhar Kund (400MW), Panchgotia (225MW) on river Suara and Hathiadah-Durgawati (1600MW) on river Durgawati in the hilly region of Kaimur district’s Adhaura block, which has been pending clearance for a long time despite the completion of major legwork including feasibility studies for the project, between year 2000 and 2010, officials aware of the developments said.
The preliminary project reports along with clarifications and details sought by the Central agencies were duly furnished by BHPC during this period and the National Hydroelectric Power Corporation (NHPC) also conducted surveys of the four sites and made a pre-feasibility report. Not just that, a team of Japan Bank of International Cooperation- now, renamed as Japan International Cooperation Agency—too, got a project viability assessment done.
The study commissioned by JICA found the Hathiadah-Durgawati pump storage scheme to be very attractive and suggested that it is run on a base load of 400MW throughout the year on completion, therefore endorsing the project’s potential to become a pump storage-cum power plant. It also agreed to extend financial assistance to the project, said LP Sinha, retired BHPC managing director (MD), who worked on the project proposals during his tenure.
The then principal secretary, energy, Bihar, Rameshwar Singh, wrote on September 29, 2010, to the Union ministry of power highlighting how these environment-friendly and carbon emission-free projects were likely to result in rapid augmentation of power generation, stability of transmission and meeting the state’s power demand, MP Chhedi Paswan said.
