Utran push to Gujarat power saga

Chief minister Narendra Modi on Thursday said that Gujarat is the only state in the entire country that has managed to overcome electricity scarcity. He said 18,000 villages of Gujarat receive electric supply 24X7 and there is no load-shedding anywhere in the state.

He said this while inaugurating a 370 MW gas-based power station at Utran in Surat. The power station has been commissioned by Gujarat State Electricity Corporation Limited (GSECL). It is GSECL's first gas-based power plant.

The GSECL has completed the construction of this power station in just 21 months at a cost of Rs1,414 crore. Modi said that Gujarat is the highest producer of gas-based electricity, with gas-based electricity generation making up about 32% of the total electricity
generated in the state.

"The Gujarat Electricity Board (GEB) was continuously making annual losses to the tune of around Rs2,000 crore before 2000. Today, electricity companies in Gujarat have overcome the losses and have become efficient," he said. He said other states slip into surprises when they hear there is no load-shedding in Gujarat, while tariffs here are also lower compared to that in those states.

"This is because we have changed the entire structure of our electricity distribution and generation system in last few years.

Today, we have turned the hugely loss-making company into a profitable one," Modi said.

He added that the state government would develop more gas-based power stations in near future to control pollution, while the capacity of Utran power station will be raised to 500 MW.

The CM lashed out at UPA government for not providing space at the railway bridge between Surat and Utran to lay gas pipelines. He claimed because this lakhs of families in the area are deprived of getting piped cooking gas.

Modi said the opening of the power station was a path-breaker for the entire country as advanced technologies have been put into use at the plant. Water discharged from the plant is 100% pure, while no chlorine gas is used for water treatment. Daily gas consumption of the plant is 15.60 lakh SCM, through which it produces 88.80 lakh units daily. The entire plant has been developed by Alstom Technologies.
(With Kapil Dave in Gandhinagar)