The Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) has proposed initiating a centralized tendering process for the current year’s target of 450,000 standalone solar pumps under Component B of the Pradhan Mantri Kisan Urja Suraksha evam Utthan Mahabhiyan (PM-KUSUM) program.

The ministry has invited suggestions and comments from all stakeholders on issues like participation in the tender, technical and financial requirements, number of vendors to be empaneled in each category, cluster wise bidding, minimum capacity allocation to the lowest bidder, and contract performance guarantee requirements, among others.

The stakeholders should submit their responses to the implementation of Component B of the KUSUM program by September 30, 2020.

The ministry is planning to install 1.75 million standalone solar water pumps by the year 2022. As against the first-year target of 175,000 solar pumps, the ministry noted that centralized tendering was concluded through EESL, and installations are now under progress. EESL issued a tender for 175,000 off-grid solar water pumps in August 2019 and 181,200 off-grid solar pumps in December 2019.

The MNRE released the guidelines for the KUSUM program in July last year. The program comprises of the following components:

• Component A: Set up 10 GW of decentralized ground-mounted grid-connected solar projects of individual project size of up to 2 MW
• Component B: Install 1.75 million standalone solar-powered agriculture pumps of individual capacity up to 7.5 HP
• Component C: Solarize 1 million grid-connected agriculture pumps of individual capacity up to 7.5 HP

Recently, MNRE issued new clarifications for the KUSUM program. According to the clarifications, for Component B and Component C of the program, the state share of subsidy will be a minimum of 30% of the applicable benchmark cost or the cost discovered in auctions, whichever is lower.

Earlier this month, the Central Electronics Limited invited bids for 1,707 grid-connected solar pumps under the program’s component C.

Previously, MNRE released amendments to the guidelines for the implementation of Component C of the PM-KUSUM program. Under Component C of the KUSUM program, the government aims to solarize one million grid-connected agriculture pumps of individual capacity up to 7.5 HP by 2022.