Sunday ET: Bidding for two big power projects to begin in a month

NEW DELHI: The Centre will initiate bidding of two ultra mega power projects in Odisha and Tamil Nadu worth Rs 40,000 crore in a month.

On Friday, an empowered group of ministers cleared new bidding norms for power plants. “We will start bidding of the two ultra mega power projects at Bedhabahal in Odisha and Cheyyur in Tamil Nadu within a month,” a senior power ministry official said.

The project in Odisha has been deferred for over two years, initially due to of lack of forest clearance to attached coal blocks and later for want of new bidding norms. The Centre has so far awarded four ultra mega power projects of which only one owned by Tata Power at Mundra in Gujarat is functional.

The other three at Sasan in Madhya Pradesh, Krishnapatnam in Andhra Pradesh and Tilaiya in Jharkhand were bagged by Reliance Power.