The Railway Energy Management Company Limited (REMCL), a joint venture of the Indian Railways and RITES, has invited bids for setting up a 740 MW ground-mount solar project on vacant lands belonging to Indian Railways.

The last date to submit the bids is August 26, 2021, and bids will be opened on the same day.

Interested bidders will have to submit an amount of ₹400,000 (~$5,482)/MW as earnest money deposit. Successful bidders will have to furnish an amount of ₹800,000 (~$10,966)/MW as the performance bank guarantee.

The zonal railways will enter into a power purchase agreement (PPA) with the successful developer for 25 years from the date as per PPA provisions. The tariff quoted by the bidder will be inclusive of all statutory taxes, duties, levies, and cess among others.

Only commercially established and operational technologies should be used to minimize the technology risk and to achieve the timely commissioning of the projects.

The responsibility of getting connectivity with the transmission system owned by the state transmission utility or the central transmission utility as may be required will be of the developer. The transmission of power up to the interconnection point and delivery point where the metering is done for energy accounting will be the developer’s obligation. The developer also has to take care of the maintenance of the transmission system up to the interconnection point.

The arrangement of connectivity must be made by the developer through a dedicated transmission line for the individual project or pooled projects, as the case may be.

The declared annual capacity utilization factor (CUF) should, in no case, be less than 17%. The developer should maintain generation to achieve annual CUF within + 10% and -15% of the declared value until the end of 10 years from the commissioning date. This is subject to the annual CUF remaining minimum of 15%, and within +10% and -20% of the declared value of the annual CUF after that until the end of the PPA duration of 25 years.

The cells and modules used in the project should be sourced only from the models and manufacturers included in the ‘Approved List of Models and Manufacturers’ published by MNRE.

To participate in the bidding process, the bidder’s net worth should be greater than or equal to ₹8 million (~$109,660)/MW of the quoted capacity as of the last date of the previous financial year. The bidder’s minimum annual turnover should be ₹4.145 million (~$56,817)/MW of the quoted capacity during the last financial year.

The internal resource generation capability in the form of profit before depreciation, interest, and taxes for a minimum amount of ₹830,000 (~$11,377)/MW of the quoted capacity as of the last date of the previous financial year. The bidder should have, in principle, an approval letter from the lending institution committing a line of credit of ₹1.036 million (~$14,201)/MW of the quoted capacity towards meeting the working capital requirement of the project.

REMCL has also invited bids to develop up to 400 MW of grid-connected solar projects on vacant lands of the Indian Railways. The solar project will be developed under the capital expenditure (CAPEX) model.

According to Mercom’s India Solar Tender Tracker, REMCL has tendered nearly 3 GW of solar capacity as of date.