Asian Development Bank to finance
Himachal Pradesh Energy Project
India and the Asian Development Bank (ADB) today signed an
agreement for the first tranche under the 350 million dollars 'Himachal Pradesh
Clean Energy Transmission Investment Programme', which is a multi-tranche
financing facility.
The total estimated investment cost of the programme is
437.85 million dollars, which includes financing of 87.85 million dollars by
the Himachal Pradesh Government.
The signatories were Venu Rajamony Joint Secretary
(Multilateral Institutions), Department of Economic Affairs, Ministry of
Finance, on behalf of the Government of India, and Hun Kim, ADB Country
Director for India.
Deepak Sanan, Principal Secretary (Power) and Vijay Kumar
Kaprate, Director (Planning and Contracts) signed the project agreements on
behalf of the State Government and the Utility Himachal Pradesh Power
Transmission Corporation Ltd. (HPPTCL) respectively.
Speaking on the occasion, Rajamony said that this programme
would help in upgrading the transmission system of Himachal Pradesh to take
advantage of its vast hydropower resources.
"It will not only contribute to economic development
in Himachal Pradesh, but will also enable a clean, indigenous source of energy
to flow to other parts of the country where demand is rising as a result of
strong economic growth, he added.
Hun Kim stated that the programme will fund much needed new
high voltage lines and other transmission infrastructure to allow the state to
increase output to meet growing local and national demand for electricity.
ADB's loan has a 25-year term including grace period of
five years and interest determined in accordance with ADB's LIBOR-based lending
facility.
Himachal Pradesh, a small mountainous state with five major
rivers, has about a quarter of India's total hydropower generation potential. It
wants to scale up generation, but its transmission facilities in certain
locations are currently unable to handle large amounts of additional power
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