Rajasthan Electronics and Instruments Limited (REIL), a joint venture between the government of India and the government of Rajasthan, has invited bids for rate contract manufacturing of 10,000 polycrystalline solar modules of wattage capacity greater than 330 Wp made from 72 polycrystalline solar cells.

The last date to submit the bids is November 8, 2021. Bids will be opened on November 9.

The tender is open for only Indian module manufacturers, and the bidder should specify that the cells have been procured from an Indian manufacturer or a foreign manufacturer.

The total quantity is to be supplied within three months from the date of the issuance of the purchase order.

The successful bidder will have to furnish an amount of 5% of the contract value as the performance bank guarantee.

The solar modules must be free of cracks, air bubbles, cuts, patches, spots, marks, mechanical damage, or color and pattern mismatches.

The successful bidder should provide a warranty of five years and six months from the date of supply against any manufacturing defect. The peak watt capacity of the solar modules should not be less than 90% at the end of ten years and 80% at the end of 25 years.

REIL has stated that the modules should perform satisfactorily with ambient temperatures between -10°C and +85°C and should withstand gusts up to 170 Km/hour on the panel’s surface. Each solar module should be checked for conformity with the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) standards, and no negative power tolerance will be accepted.

The interconnected cells should be laminated in vacuum to withstand adverse environmental conditions.

The bidder should have a minimum of 20 MW per annum of in-house module manufacturing capacity, and the modules should be manufactured at the vendor’s facility. The vendor should have manufactured and supplied 3 MW of solar modules during the last year.

The vendor should have manufactured solar modules using indigenous or imported cells, which must have been used in projects in successful operation for at least 24 months as on the last day of the previous financial year. A performance certificate or letter from the client is required to support the claim.

A manufacturer’s test report and a quality certificate must accompany all consignments indicating compliance with the required specification.

As per the tender document, 20% of the tendered quantity has been earmarked for micro and small enterprise (MSE) suppliers. Out of the 20%, 4% has been allocated for procurement from MSEs owned by Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe entrepreneurs.

An MSE vendor quoting within the price band of L1 (lowest bid) +15% will be allowed to supply the portion of the requirement subject to the acceptance of the L1 price.  In the case of more than one such MSE vendor, the supply will be shared proportionately.

Recently, REIL invited bids to procure 7,000 solar modules of minimum 380 W made from 72 monocrystalline solar cells.

Earlier, REIL had issued a rate contract tender for 8,000 monocrystalline or polycrystalline solar modules of 160W, 320W, 325W, and 340W.

According to Mercom’s India Solar Tender Tracker, REIL has issued tenders to procure 116,610 solar modules to date.