A tender for 750 MW solar power capacity at Bhadla Solar Park in Rajasthan has received huge interest with more than 8,500 MW in technical bids. This means that the tender was oversubscribed by 12 times, according to Mercom Capital Group.
This points at solar power developers eager for projects as the solar power auction activity has slowed down in recent months, in particular after the results of Rewa Ultra Mega Solar Park were announced in February 2017 (see Record Low Tariff Of 2.97 INR/kWh In India).
The Solar Energy Corporation of India (SECI) had issued the tender for the Bhadla Solar Park in November 2016 (see New Record-Low Benchmark PV Tariff In India). SECI had slashed the reserve price of the 750 MW Bhadla tender by 11% to 4 INR ($0.0602) per kWh. The entire capacity was to come up in two batches of 500 MW in Bhadla Phase-III and 250 MW in Bhadla Phase-IV. Mercom says the benchmark price was 3.93 INR ($0.0590) per kWh.
In January 2017, SECI had floated two separate tenders of 100 MW as part of Phase III of the National Solar Mission and another 50 MW under Phase IV. Both these projects were to be developed in the domestic content requirement (DCR) category which makes it imperative for developers to use locally manufactured solar cells and modules.
Two months later, SECI terminated the entire 150 MW capacity and restored the 500 MW and 250 MW capacity in the open bidding category (see India Terminates 150 MW Local Content PV Tender).
Mercom believes that tariffs for the 750 MW bidding are expected to go low again at times of fewer auctions for capacities above 100 MW, hyper competition and tender oversubscription in India. Only recently Engie subsidiary Solairedirect won 250 MW capacity at Kadapa solar park in Andhra Pradesh for 3.15 INR ($0.0486) per kWh (see New Low For Solar Tariffs In India).
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