Sustainable business plan: Solar PV power

Equally worse are Canal roof top power projects and PMO did acknowledge to know more details on money spent on Canal repairs, which eventually, you are now hearing in Irrigation irregularities in Maharashtra...Any policy making has to be sustainable and be holistic. Nevertheless, PILOT plants will yield some results and we should stop copying without knowing the high amount of structures, interruptions in evacuation, repeat maintenance in future at Tax payer's money etc:

Congratulations to your team, GEDA and the Principal Secretary (EPD) of Govt of Gujarat for taking an initiative to harness renewable energy on top of the canal.

Though i come from Hydro Power back ground too, Though the initiative is to use the land on top of canal, we need to build an additional security in to the system to have UN INTERRUPTED POWER with following in mind:

a). Normally, the side wall erosion takes place in canals (in some cases every year, which can be seen from PWD department or minor irrigation department expenses) or sometimes breach of canal wall happens as we have been observing since independence in various state irrigation projects, which is a routine tender and a business case for petty contractors who have dwelled two generations with this business opportunity as part of Canal Maintenance budget of State government irrigation departments or such revenue schemes.

b). The panels and its structures mounted above may cause hindrance to the repairs and it may even destroy few panels, thus, the tax payers have to pay for such losses or theft of panels due to various agencies / departments involved in repairs etc. Thus, the power generation MAY get stopped in reality. This repair of Canal wall MAY also create additional expenditure (additional burden on Gujarat's Taxpayer) to maintain the Solar PV plant due to such losses or re installation (if panels are removed for removing the debris from the canal which is a practical difficulty) What is your view on the same?

c). As the Operation and Maintenance agency for Solar PV power generation will have its own security agency, it may be a good scheme to protect the CANAL BREACH at distributory (few miscreants may break the wall in the nights or few may use pipes to siphon the water from canal to their fields in the night through their DG sets, therefore, we also foresee this kind of Solar PV project can bring down the costs of Canal Maintenance. If the PV Plant Security (which is a cost to Government too) is insufficient as it runs in to Kilo meters, then, breach or such mishaps may recur and it may prove additional expense to the Government.

In our view, any new initiative is a most welcome point, but, the sustainability needs a transparency and the people of Gujarat need to be informed in PUBLIC thorough the web site or such seminars about the pros and cons, so that other states, if they copy such project development, shall be aware of Maintenance and sustainability issues too.