Fitch Ratings has predicted that a slew of factors, including pricier fuel and higher interest rates, will result in a slowdown in the launch of new power generation projects in 2012. In its ’2012 Outlook: Indian Power’ report, global ratings agency Fitch said the power sector would remain exposed to both fuel availability and price [...]

Fortunes of gas-based power projects seem to be in for a tough time, as production from the KG-D6 basin falling. Contracts for power plants also froze, according to reports. It was in July 2010 Alstom Projects won a Euro 450-million (Rs 3,130-crore) order from GVK for their 800-Mw gas-based Jegurupadu-III power project in Andhra’s East [...]

Ernst & Young said in a report that the engineering, procurement and construction sector is facing major challenges, including inordinate delays in land acquisition, regulatory bottlenecks and difficulty in getting working capital funds. Sushi Shyamal, Ernst & Young India Partner, Infrastructure Practice, while releasing a report on ‘EPC: Driving growth efficiently’, said that “Land acquisition [...]

The Centre for Science and Enviroment had trawled government records to find that in the 11th Plan period, 267 thermal power plants were granted clearances amounting to 1.76 lakh MW installed capacity – almost double the existing installed capacity in the country. This is about two and a half times the capacity of thermal power [...]

Various factors including global economic uncertainty, high interest rates and the lack of new policy initiatives have driven new project announcements in the country to its lowest in the past couple of years. “The new project announcements by Indian corporates are drying up rapidly. In September quarter this year, only 770 projects worth Rs 2.60 [...]

Business Today has done a detailed investigative study on the existing Environmental Impact Assessment system that approves major projects. Nellore’s 5,000-crore aquaculture industry, which is providing daily bread to lakhs of people, is in for threat. Not just the business, as well as the landscape around the area, may get devastated. The reason is the [...]

A report by global accounting and consultancy firm Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu says lack of fuel availability and weak finances of distribution utilities are crippling the growth of Indian power sector. Coal linkages awarded to projects under construction had actually less reserves compared to estimates, increasing risk of inadequacies in supply, said the report ‘Empowering Ideas [...]

Bloomberg has an interesting story on why Tata Power, India’s leading power generation company refrained from bidding for solar projects under JNNSM. While I personally feel that this might hamper the ‘postive climate’ surrounding solar pv and thermal projects, it raises several valid questions. In summary Mr.Banmali Agrawala, senior officer from Tata Group has to [...]

This is an excerpt from a report authored by Dr. V. Bakthavatsalam Managing Director Indian Renewable Energy Development Agency Ltd and published by United States Energy Organization. The financing of Renewable Energy (RE) projects cannot be accomplished with one basic project financing strategy in the way that many large scale conventional energy projects are often [...]