NHPC Extends Bid Submission Deadline for its 2 GW Solar Tender

NHPC has in its latest notification extended the deadline for bid submission for its tender for 2 GW of solar PV projects.

The National Hydroelectric Power Corporation (NHPC) has in its latest notification extended the deadline for bid submission for its tender for 2 GW of solar PV projects. The deadline for bid submissions has been extended until January 10, 2019, with the techno-commercials bids now scheduled to be opened on January 14, 2019. The original tender deadline was September 27, 2019.

Besides extending the deadline for the tender, the corporation has also issued a few amendments to the tender.

1. The minimum tariff payable to the project has now been increased to Rs 2.78/kWh from the Rs 2.65/kWh. Initially, the NHPC had set a tariff ceiling of Rs 2.95/kWh however, in its first amendment that was issued in October 2019, the ceiling tariff was revised to Rs 2.65/kWh. The tariff will be applicable for 25 years.
2. The amount of earnest money deposit (EMD) has also been reduced from Rs 10 lakh/ MW of bid capacity to Rs 4 lakh/MW.
3. The tender calls for the cells and modules used in the project to be sourced only from the models and manufacturers included in the Approved List of Models and Manufacturers  (ALMM) as published by MNRE and updated as on the date of commissioning of the project.
4. Also as per the new provisions, in case the partial capacity offered to the last bidder after the conclusion of the e-reverse auction is less than 50 percent of the total quoted capacity by the bidder, the bidder can refuse partial capacity offered. On the other hand, if the partial capacity offered is greater than or equal to 50 percent of the total quoted capacity by the bidder, it will be mandatory to accept the partial capacity offered.

As per the official sources, the deadline for the tender has been extended because of the new amendments that had to be introduced into the tender, and because prospective bidders had requested for the amendments and the subsequent deadline extension for preparation of bid documents.

The NHPC states that the interested bidder can bid for projects at multiple locations as long as each project has a minimum capacity of 50 MW. However, the bidder is expected to quote a single tariff for the entire project capacity offered. Also, The total capacity of bids should not exceed 600 MW.

PC: Acciona