The Punjab Government will be setting up a thermal plant in Jharkhand with a minimum capacity of 1,320 MW as part of efforts to increase power generation capacity.
“The State Government is all set to establish one thermal plant at pithead of state’s coal mine in Jharkhand,” Punjab Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal said on Friday.
Punjab has a coal mine in Jharkhand and the plant there will reduce the State Government’s transportation cost of coal. “We will have a plant with minimum capacity of 1,320 MW near the coal mine in Jharkhand which will help in reducing our transportation cost for coal.
The power generated will be transmitted through power lines to the state,” a senior official in Punjab Power department said here.
Badal said by the end of 2013, the State’s power capacity from all sources will reach 14,487 MW against the capacity of 6,591 MW being generated when SAD-BJP Government came to power in 2007.
“Our Government took the task of power generation as most important task of governance,” he said at a CII power conference here.
“After becoming a power surplus State, we are aiming to become cheapest source of power in the country and we will export power to other States, and if allowed by the Union Government, to Pakistan also,” he said.