i Develop Stocks Advisory

PowerGrid to seek $600 mn from World Bank, ADB State-owned PowerGrid Corp will seek fresh loan of $600 million (Rs 2,400 crore) from the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank to fund its mega transmission projects, including those relating to the ultra mega power projects. PGCIL, which has won transmission projects for the three ultra mega power projects, would approach ADB for $400 million and the World Bank for $200 million, a company official said. "This would be over and above $800 million (Rs 3,200 crore) already sought from the two multilateral agencies," he said, adding the loans would be guaranteed by the government which owns majority shareholding in the PSU. The company expects to achieve a turnover of Rs 5,400 crore in the next fiscal, an 18 per cent rise over the previous year's revenues. The country requires over Rs 70,000 crore during 2007-12 for expanding and upgrading the electricity transmission network. Of this, only about Rs 20,000 crore would be invested by private players and the remaining would have to be spent by PGCIL and other public sector utilities. The company targets to add about 5,500 circuit kms of extra high voltage transmission lines and about 6,300 MVA of transformation capacity in this financial year (2008-09). The BSE listed company, which recently received Navratna status from the government, is planning to foray into the neighbouring countries, beginning with Myanmar.