Centre fixes 2017 deadline for 6 NE power projects

By Our Staff Reporter

Guwahati, May 5: There are six power projects with total capacity 2,954 MW coming up in the Northeast, but none of these projects are on schedule. Some of them have been delayed by four to six years. The under-construction projects in Aruchal Pradesh alone will have capacity of 2,854 MW.

Faced with protests over the project, the Central government has now fixed 2021 as the "anticipated deadline" for commissioning the Lower Subansiri project but that too is "subject to restart of construction works."

In Assam, the origil commissioning schedule for the coal-based NTPC project at Bongaigaon was May, 2011. The target for commissioning of the 500 MW project stands re-scheduled to April-June, 2017.

The 100 MW APDCL's project at mrup, which was earlier scheduled to be completed in January 2012, has been re-scheduled for September, 2016.

If the projects are commissioned as per the new target dates, the region will generate an additiol 625 MW of power by 2017. There are 21 power projects with capacity 3,261 MW presently functiol in the Northeast.

Seven of them - with capacity 1,202 MW - are in Assam.

This information was given by Power minister Piyush Goyal in response to a question by Dhubri MP Badruddin Ajmal in the Lok Sabha today.