Engineering and manufacturing enterprise Bharat Heavy Electrical Limited (BHEL) has successfully commissioned India’s largest floating solar plant in India. The 25 megawatts (MW) floating solar plant is situated at NTPC Simhadri, Andhra Pradesh.
With the project spread over 100 acres of area, it is expected to help in saving valuable resources and yield better results compared to the conventional ground-mounted projects due to the cooling effect.
According to the official company release, the plant will also reduce water evaporation by providing shade to the covered area. “Notably, with its unique state-of-the-art design, the project is an engineering marvel, created by BHEL. The company has designed an innovative floating array to meet the anchoring requirement of the support structures without touching or loading, either the reservoir floor or the bund structure,” the company said in a statement.
BHEL said its scope of work in the project included design, engineering, procurement and construction of the solar project, which has been executed by the company’s recently formed Solar Business Division.
“This complex module array has been designed – for the first time in India – to withstand gusts of wind up to 180 km per hour. In view of the coastal location of the project site that leads to severe corrosion, all the platform structures and other equipment have been made corrosion-resistant,” the release added.
The costs involved in the project have not been disclosed yet.
With the largest portfolio of floating solar projects in the country, BHEL has commissioned more than 45 MW projects and another 107 MW are already under the way. The company provides solutions for both grid-interactive and off-grid, ground-mounted, rooftop, floating and canal top solar plants. It possesses an overall EPC portfolio of more than 1.2 GW and also manufactures space-grade solar panels and batteries for space applications.