The ongoing holiday season with numerous bank holidays has prompted the Karnataka Renewable Energy Development Limited (KREDL) to once again extend the bid submission deadline of the recent tender for 50 MW (10 MW x 2 blocks + 15 MW x 2 blocks) of solar projects at Pavagada Solar Park, located in Tumkur district of Karnataka.

This is the second extension of the tender’s bid submission deadline.

The new online bid submission deadline is December 31, 2018 while the hard-copy bid submission deadline is January 2, 2019. The techno-commercial bid will open on January 2, 2019. The earlier online bid submission deadline was December 28, 2018 and the hard-copy bid submission deadline was December 31, 2018. The opening date of price bid will be informed later.

Recently, Mercom reported about KREDL’s tender for the selection of engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contractor for developing 50 MW of grid-connected solar projects at Pavagada Solar Park.

The scope of work includes the EPC, design, supply, erection, installation, testing, and commissioning of the project with associated transmission system and operation and maintenance (O&M).

The Pavagada solar park covers 13,000 acres and is expected to have total capacity of 2 GW when it is complete. To facilitate development, the park has been divided into eight blocks of 250 MW each that will have a dedicated high voltage supply lines, pooling stations, and a pooling substation for evacuation.

In January 2018, KREDL had tendered 1,200 MW of grid-connected solar PV projects to be developed at Pavagada. However, KREDL was able to auction merely  550 MW of the tendered capacity due to poor response from bidders amid various ongoing uncertainties in the solar sector.

Then in April 2018, KREDL retendered 650 MW of grid-connected solar projects to be developed at the Pavagada Solar Park. KREDL then  awarded 250 MW of solar projects each to Fortum Corporation and Tata Power Renewable Energy Ltd (TPREL).

In June 2018, Mercom reported that KREDL issued a tender for the development of 150 MW (50 MW x 3 blocks) of grid connected solar projects at Pavagada.

According to the Mercom India Solar Project Tracker, Karnataka has installed large-scale solar capacity of over 5.3 GW and has a development pipeline of ~2.5 GW, making it the leading solar state.

Nitin is a staff reporter at Mercomindia.com and writes on renewable energy and related sectors. Prior to Mercom, Nitin has worked for CNN IBN, India News, Agricultural Spectrum and Bureaucracy Today. He received his bachelor’s degree in Journalism & Communication from Manipal Institute of Communication at Manipal University and Master’s degree in International Relations from Jindal School of International Affairs. More articles from Nitin Kabeer