ReNew Power sets up wind-solar hybrid at Gujarat

ReNew Power on Tuesday announced that it has set up Gujarat’s first wind-solar hybrid project at the Chlor-Alkali unit of Grasim Industries Ltd in Vilayat, Bharuch.

The first phase of the hybrid project, with 17.6 MW commercial-scale wind-solar, commenced operations last week and is expected to generate 80 million units of renewable energy every year, mitigating 75,000 tCO2e (carbon emissions) annually, an official statement said.

The partnership will expand further with an additional 16.68 MW, which will be commissioned in the next financial year (FY23), as part of the second phase. The project is being developed by ReNew Green Solutions (RGS), the B2B arm of ReNew Power. Both the parties have entered into a 25-year PPA, which will see the project supply power for the plant at Vilayat, Bharuch, via an Open Access mechanism, it said.

Once both phases are commissioned with a combined capacity of 34.28 MW, the partnership is expected to generate a total of approximately 160 million units of renewable electricity annually, mitigating a cumulative 150,000 tCO2e (carbon emission) a year, it said

Both phases together have a total investment of Rs 382 crore through an equity partnership.

“With corporates increasingly harnessing renewable energy, ReNew aims to develop around 250 MW of wind-solar hybrid projects in Gujarat for commercial and industrial consumers, like we have just done at Vilayat, Bharuch,” Mayank Bansal, Chief Commercial Officer, ReNew Power, said

Gujarat notified its solar policy in 2009 and was the first state to announce a hybrid policy in 2018. It has made hybrid plants attractive for investments by corporates by providing incentives such as a waiver on electricity duty.