Govt looks to make India a power equipment mfg hub

With four new power equipment manufacturers entering the market, the government is looking to make India a manufacturing hub for electrical machinery. “Besides the very reliable technology of BHEL-Siemens, we have private players like L&T-Mitsubishi, Toshiba-JSW and Bharat Forge-Alstom entering power equipment manufacturing in India,” Power Secretary Anil Razdan said. This will give power generation companies the choice of vendors. Also, local manufacturing will be assured availability of parts as well as servicing after supply of equipment. “We feel India has the potential to become a manufacturing hub for world-class energy-efficient thermal equipment. Keeping this in mind, we have consciously promoted supercritical technology for coal-based thermal power stations,” he said, adding, “We can provide an export market for these equipment in the years to come”. Asked whether India had the technology for super-critical thermal power plants, Razdan said the government was banking on technology from private players and the joint venture companies formed recently to carry out manufacturing in the power sector. There are numerous challenges that the government will have to face in order to fulfil this ambition. In order to set up plants and provide transmission and distribution network for the generation companies, the government has taken various initiatives, including launch of revised Accelerated Power Development and Reforms Programme and reducing the T&D losses to 15 per cent, among others. “We also need world-class players in equipment manufacturing,” Razdan said, adding that the new joint ventures have this capability. All this will require multiplication of technical manpower to run the programme. “The engineering colleges in the country may not be sufficient in meeting the demand, therefore development of industrial training institutes at the project sites will be another challenge as this will also enable local population to get employment,” he said.