Railways takes decisive steps to transform into 'net zero' carbon emission network
Jul 06, 2020
New Delhi [India], July 6 : Indian Railways has taken decisive steps to transform into a 'net zero' carbon emission mass transportation network by 2030.
For this, the Ministry of Railways has decided to install solar power plants on its vacant unused land on a grand scale, the use of solar will accelerate Piyush Goyal's mission to achieve the conversion of Indian Railways to 'net zero' carbon emission railway.
Apart from making the Railways green it would also make it 'Atma Nirbhar' self-sufficient.
It has already started energy procurement from various solar projects like 3 MWp solar plant set up at MCF Raebareilly (Uttar Pradesh). About 100 MWp rooftop solar systems have already been commissioned on various stations and buildings of Indian Railways.
Apart from this, one project of 1.7 MWp at Bina (Madhya Pradesh) which shall be connected directly to Overhead Traction System has already been installed and is presently under extensive testing. It is likely to be commissioned within 15 days. This is the first of its kind project in the world commissioned by Indian Railways in collaboration with Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited (BHEL).
It involves the adoption of innovative technology for converting Direct Current (DC) to single-phase Alternating Current (AC) for feeding directly to Railway's overhead traction system. The solar power plant has been established near the Bina Traction Sub Station (TSS). It can produce approximately 25 lakh units of energy annually and will save around Rs 1.37 Crore for Railway every year.
In addition to this, two pilot projects for the scheme of land-based solar plants for meeting electric traction energy requirements of Indian Railways are under implementation.
One of them is a 50 MWp solar power plant on vacant unused land at Bhilai (Chhattisgarh) which shall be connected with Central Transmission Utility (CTU) and is targeted to be commissioned before March 31, 2021.
The 2 MWp solar plant at Diwana (Haryana) which shall be connected to State Transmission utility (STU) is expected to be commissioned before August 31, 2020.
