Solar panels on the roof of the state secretariat. Telegraph picture

Bhubaneswar, April 26: The government is banking on the sun to meet the power needs of the three government-run premier medical colleges and 17 other hospitals in the state.

Chief minister Naveen Patanik issued a direction to this effect today. State health and family welfare minister Damodar Rout said: “The government has decided in principle to promote solar power. The department is examining it and has planned to use solar power in the three premier medical colleges — SCB Medical College at Cuttack, MKCG Medical College at Berhmapur, VSS Medical College at Burla — as well as Capital Hospital in Bhubaneswar.”

Officials said that once the solar power system was installed, the medical colleges would get uninterrupted supply. “The power bill of the medical colleges will go down drastically,” said an official.

While the SCB Medical College power bill comes to Rs 20 lakh a month, VSS Medical College and Hospital spends Rs 4.5 lakh every month and the MKCG Medical College and Hospital’s power bill touches Rs 6 lakh for a similar period.

The government also plans to introduce rooftop solar power systems at the offices of the departments of agriculture, revenue and disaster, home, health and family welfare, SC/ ST development, general administration, women and child development, school and mass education and higher education.

The Odisha Renewable Development Energy Agency (Oreda ) will act as the nodal agency. Oreda officials said they had already asked the state government for budgetary support.

Oreda chief William Bilung said: “We have already installed solar power at the state secretariat and it has started functioning. The science and technology department has also availed of solar power. The solar power system in Raj Bhavan will be operational soon.”

The Oreda officials said they had installed 45,000 single-point solar connections across the state mostly in remote areas. “We are now producing 13MW of power and it is directly distributed to the feeder. Most of the power is now being produced in Balangir district,” Bilung said.

The state government has decided to set up Odisha Green Energy Development Corporation to tap Odisha’s renewable energy potential.

The corporation will function as a subsidiary of the state-owned Odisha Hydro Power Production Limited.

It will prepare a plan to tap 16,230MW non-conventional energy as evaluated by Oreda. Most of the effort will go in generating solar energy.