The Solar Energy Corporation of India (SECI) has extended the bid submission deadline for the 20 MW (AC) solar power project with a 20 MW/50 MWh battery energy storage system (BESS) at Phyang in Leh district of Ladakh.

The new deadline for bid submission has been set as February 24, 2021. The earlier deadline was February 10, 2021.

In December last year, SECI floated a tender for a 20 MW solar power project with a 50 MWh BESS in Leh district of the union territory of Ladakh.

The scope of work includes the design, engineering, procurement, supply, testing, packing, associated civil works, installation, testing, and commissioning of the solar power project and BESS, along with interconnected transmission lines and performance demonstration.

SECI has also issued amendments to the bidding document. As per the amendment, the time for commissioning of the project with all other associated equipment will be 18 months from the date of the issuance of the Letter of Award (LoA) or Notice to Proceed (NTP) provided by the employer, whichever is later. The employer will provide the NTP in the shortest possible time. All contractual obligations will be started from the Notification of Award (NOA) date or NTP, whichever is later. In the earlier version, there was some ambiguity regarding the NTP being provided by the employer.

In the contract’s special conditions, the contract performance security will be in the form of a bank guarantee only and issued in the name of SECI. The value of the contract performance security will be 3% of the contract value. The performance security will be valid for a total period of 141 months from its issuance date. Earlier, the validity of the performance security was valid for 147 months from its issuance date.

The nodal agency also clarified that the bifacial modules (25 MW) should be vertically mounted with an azimuth of 90 degrees in the E-W orientation configuration. The remaining 25 MW (DC) capacity should be south-facing as per the standard design. It also added that the number of transformers should be two, each having 20 MVA rated capacity, and the entire BESS component should be placed at one location.

Recently, SECI floated a global tender for consultancy services for a 100 MW (AC) solar project along with a 40 MW/120 MWh BESS in Rajnandgaon, Chhattisgarh. In September 2020, SECI invited bids for a 100 MW (AC) solar power project and a 50 MW/150 MWh of BESS at Rajnandgaon in Chhattisgarh. Later in November, SECI reduced the BESS capacity to 40 MW/120 MWh from 50 MW/150 MWh.

Earlier, Mercom reported that SECI had extended the bid submission deadline for its tender for 14 MW of solar projects with 42 MWh battery energy storage system (7MW/21 MWh each). The projects are set to be developed at Leh and Kargil.

According to Mercom’s India Solar Tender Tracker, SECI has issued 393 MW of solar tenders for projects with BESS as of December 2020.