Tata Power Renewable Energy Ltd. (TPREL), a wholly owned subsidiary of Tata Power, has commissioned a 25 MW grid-connected solar photovoltaic (PV) project in Charanka Solar Park in Gujarat ahead of schedule.

According to a company release, TPREL won the contract to develop the solar PV project in November 2016 under the National Solar Mission (NSM) of the Government of India through the viability gap funding (VGF) mode. The project commissioning announcement comes a full month ahead of the December 2017 commissioning date set forth in the project’s power purchase agreement (PPA).

According to Mercom’s India Solar Project Tracker, TPREL had quoted a VGF of over ₹10 million (~$0.15 million)/MW along with a fixed tariff of ₹4.43 (~$0.068)/kWh to develop the 25 MW project, under the NSM P2 B4 DCR program.

The solar project is spread across a 113-acre area and TPREL has entered into 25-year PPA for the project with Solar Energy Corporation of India (SECI) at a tariff of ₹4.43 (~$0.068)/kWh.

“We aim to create a focused renewable energy business in TPREL with a sustained growth trajectory. The commissioning of the 25 MW solar plant in Gujarat marks a milestone in our drive to grow our portfolio of clean and renewable energy generation. We are grateful to the Government of Gujarat and to the nodal agencies for their support while we were developing the project. As always, we will continue to look for opportunities to acquire operating wind and solar plants, apart from our own organic growth pipeline, to grow our generation portfolio,” said Rahul Shah, chief executive officer of TPREL.

Recently, TPREL also commissioned a 30 MW grid-connected solar PV project developed under India’s domestic content requirement category at Palaswade village in Maan Taluka, in the Satara district of Maharashtra.

According to Mercom’s Q2 India report, Tata Power had the largest cumulative installed capacity of any Indian solar project developer at the end of Q2 2017. The company also reported profits for its renewables business saw an impressive jump in Q2 FY18, rising by 200 percent to ₹1.73 billion (~$26.7 million) from ₹860 million (~$13.3 million) in Q2 FY17.

Image credit: TPREL