The Solar Energy Corporation of India Ltd. (SECI) has extended the bid submission deadline for 50 MW of solar PV projects at Kasargod Solar Park, located in the state of Kerala, to April 4, 2019, from the previously set deadline of February 25, 2019.

The techno-commercial bid will open on the same date.

SECI had tendered the solar project in February 2019.  The projects will be developed on a turnkey basis. SECI had announced this tender on behalf of THDC India Limited (formerly known as Tehri Hydro Development Corporation Ltd).

To be eligible to bid, a bidder should have installed and commissioned grid-connected solar PV power projects of a cumulative capacity not less than 25 MW in the last seven financial years.

Extended deadlines and postponements of tenders, auctions, and PPA signings has become standard practice. Almost all developers need to be prepared for this. However, there is a cost to all of this, as developers end up spending wasted hours preparing and rescheduling the process all leading to wasted labor hours and administrative costs.

SECI has also extended the bid submission deadline for a few other solar projects recently.

Last week, SECI extended the bid submission deadline of 97.5 MW of grid-connected rooftop solar PV projects from March 27, 2019, to April 11, 2019. The techno-commercial bids will open on April 12, 2019.

In the same week, SECI’s solar PV tender coupled with manufacturing component was also extended again.  The agency has now extended the bid submission deadline to April 4, 2014, from the earlier March 18, 2019. SECI had issued the new tender to set up 3 GW of grid-connected solar capacity linked to 1.5 GW of a solar manufacturing unit in January 2019.

Recently, the Kerala State Electricity Regulatory Commission (KSERC) approved modifications in the standard bid document relating to the capacity utilization factor (CUF), metering point, and project location for 200 MW of solar projects. In January 2019, the Kerala State Electricity Board had petitioned the KSERC to approve these modifications.

In December 2018, the KSEB had tendered 200 MW of grid-connected solar PV projects to be developed in Kerala on Independent Power Producer mode.

In January 2019, Mercom reported that Kerala was planning to develop 1,000 MW of solar projects under the SOURA program. In the first phase, projects aggregating 200 MW, both rooftop and ground-mounted, would be issued.