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Patna, Nov. 30: Deputy chief minister Sushil Kumar Modi today encouraged entrepreneurs to invest in new and renewable sources of energy as the state has a vast potential to generate around 2,000MW of power from alternative sources of energy.
“Given the state’s enormous potential to generate power from alternative sources of energy such as solar, hydel, wind, bagasse, biomass, we have started taking initiatives to attract investments in this sector. The state government has come up with a new and renewable energy policy to giving a slew of tax incentives and other facilities,” Modi said at a seminar on “Promotion of biofuel and green energy for sustainable growth and its impact on climate change” organised today by Rural Electrification Corporation Limited and Defence Research and Development Organisation.
The policy of the state government ensures incentives like exemption from electricity duty, entry tax on purchase of plant and machinery for setting up the power plant. Modi added that sugar factories have started cogeneration from bagasse (a fibrous matter that remains after sugarcane stalks are crushed to extract their juice) in the state. These factories, after earmarking energy for captive consumption, would sell the remaining power to the state electricity board.
The state has recorded a production of 70 lakh metric tonnes of paddy, which could generate about 360MW from rice husk and another 1,300MW from paddy straw, Modi said. Another 300MW could be produced from bagasse in sugar factories, 80MW from maize straw and 35MW from municipal waste, he added.
Modi said: “We have received proposals from various companies, including some of the big names engaged in the field of solar energy and biomass, across the nation.”
“Our resolve to strengthen non-conventional energy can be gauged from the fact that we have decided to illuminate the chief minister’s residence with solar energy. Now we want it to popularise it among the common masses,” he added.
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