Union Power Minister Manohar Lal on Wednesday suggested that state-run power utility Damodar Valley Corporation (DVC) may explore the equity market for fundraising for its future growth plans after becoming a company instead of continuing as a corporation.
The command area of the Kolkata-headquartered DVC, jointly owned by West Bengal, Jharkhand and the Centre, is spread over the two States. Lal reviewed the performance of the corporation and discussed the operational challenges and financial issues faced by it.
The Minister assured full support to the corporation in resolving the operational and financial issues, according to a statement issued by the Ministry of Power.
“The Minister is suggesting that we will have to become a company and go public. We have to first convert the corporation into a company after we unbundle different segments. For unbundling, the company’s generation, transmission and distribution segments have to be separated. It will take quite some time, but we will do it,” a company source told businessline.
The Minister also stressed upon the need for increasing the renewable energy portfolio of the corporation and bringing more efficiency in its operations.
Notably, the power utility is planning to increase its installed solar power capacity to around 4,000 MW by 2030, making a capital expenditure of around ₹20,000 crore. Currently, it has around 14 MW installed solar power capacity and 6,540 MW installed thermal power capacity.
DVC, which now has a total installed capacity of around 6,700 MW, is planning to make a total capital expenditure of around ₹50,000-₹60,000 crore by 2030 to add nearly 10,000 MW of capacity.
On the operational front, among others, the corporation has been facing a challenge of getting the West Bengal government’s approval to start works for the proposed 1,000 MW pump storage project at Jharkhand’s Panchet. For the proposed project, the corporation had entered into an MoU with the West Bengal State Electricity Distribution Company.
DVC has also been emphasising on the need for a uniform tariff for its consumers in West Bengal and Jharkhand. The power utility’s main functions are generation, transmission and distribution of electricity in its command area spread over the two states. However, respective electricity regulatory commissions of the two states currently decide upon their end-consumer power tariffs.
The corporation has already taken up the matter with the Ministry of Power.
“DVC is a major PSU here that is spread across two States... A few issues related to power department have been conveyed to me. We will hold discussions on that. A few issues are related to the State Government, we will discuss that too,” the minister told mediapersons after his meeting with the DVC management.