No thermal power station at Tadadi

Instead a gas-based project will come up

 
Instead, Karnataka Power Corporation Limited will setup a gas-based power project of 2,100 generation capacity at the place. Minister for Power K S Eshwarappa, who informed this to reporters here on Thursday, claimed that gas-based project is eco-friendly and hoped that the green groups will not have any grouse against the same.

The project will come up at 600 acre land, which has already been acquired by the KIADB. The KPCL will invest Rs 400 crore in the proposed project which will have three units with the installed capacity to generate 700 MW each. More than 16 companies have come forward to supply gas from abroad. The KPCL will enter into a ten year agreement for procuring gas. Tenders for constructing the power generation unit and for supplying gas will be floated by two months, he said.

An eight-km long underwater pipeline which will pass through Arabian sea will be installed to supply gas. The gas storage unit will come up at 150 acre land near Tadadi, he said.
The minister said that air pollution from the fly ash and disturbance to marine ecology due to release of hot water was apprehended from the thermal power plant. He denied that thermal power project was dropped due to opposition from ecologists.

“During a conference on energy held in New Delhi on August 17 and 18, the issue of opposition to thermal power plant in Tadadi was discussed. Experts who participated in the debate suggested me to go for gas based power plant. After assessing the viability and feasibility factors, it was decided to establish gas based plant. Clean energy can be generated here at a cost of Rs 3.40 per unit,” he stated.