Amendment to reduce investment risks
The Guidelines for Tariff Based Competitive Bidding Process for Procurement of Power from Grid Connected Wind Power Projects have been amended by Ministry of New and Renewable Energy and released on 25 July 2019.
Based on experience of bidding and after consultation with stakeholders, following amendment to these standard bidding guidelines for wind power projects, was carried out.
The Guidelines were first notified on 8 December 2017.
The latest Guidelines are:
The timeline for land acquisition for wind power projects has been extended from seven months to scheduled commissioning date, i.e. 18 months. This will help wind power project developers in states where land acquisition takes longer time.
The window for revision of declared Capacity Utilisation Factor (CUF) of wind power project has been increased to three years. The declared CUF is now allowed to revise once within three year of commercial operation date, which was earlier allowed within one year only.
The penalty on shortfall in energy corresponding to the minimum CUF, has now been fixed at 50% of the PPA tariff for the shortfall in energy terms liable to be paid by the Wind Power Generator to the Procurer. Further, the penalty shall be passed on by the Intermediary Procurer to the End Procurer after deducting the losses of Intermediary procurer. In cases of early part commissioning, the Procurer may purchase the generation, at full PPA tariff.
Commissioning Schedule of wind power project has been defined as 18 months from the date of execution of the PPA or PSA, whichever is later.
The amendments intended not only to reduce the investment risks related to the land acquisition and CUF but also to provide incentives for early part commissioning of project.
The subjectivity in penalty provisions has been removed and the penalty rate has been fixed.
The risk of wind power developers in case of delay in signing of PSA has been mitigated by starting timeline of execution of project from date of signing of PPA or PSA, whichever is later. fiinews.com
