The 1,600-megawatt Adani Godda Power Plant in India will start exporting half of its electricity to Bangladesh from middle of March this year, State Minister for Power, Energy and Mineral Resources Nasrul Hamid said.
The state minister said this after visiting the under-construction power plant at Jharkhand of India, according to a press release received in Dhaka on Tuesday.
Nasrul Hamid along with the senior official of Power Division is visiting India from January 2 to oversee the progress and final task of this mega project.
Among others, Power Secretary Md Habibur Rahman and Chairman of Bangladesh Power Development Board Engineer Md Mahbubur Rahman, were present during the inspection.
The state minister said that a dedicated transmission line has been constructed from India to supply electricity to Bangladesh. Some 750 MW of electricity from the first unit of the power plant is expected to be available by mid-March.
“More electricity is needed to meet the next summer's demand. We are also looking for alternative sources of fuel. We are working on uninterrupted power supply at an affordable price,” he added.
The second unit of the thermal power plant will start supplying the remaining capacity after going into full production next year.
Sources said Adani Power (Jharkhand) Limited (APJL), a concern of Adani Group is setting up a thermal power plant of 1600 MW (2 X 800 MW) in Godda District of Jharkhand State in India to supply electricity to Bangladesh.
The Power Grid Company of Bangladesh has already constructed two substations in Chapainawabganj and Bogra in addition to carrying out other transmission work simultaneously.
The power, which is expected to meet the growing power demand in Rajshahi and Rangpur regions, the country’s agricultural economic centre as well as capital Dhaka.
Under the agreement signed between the Power Division of Bangladesh and Adani Power Limited, India on November 5, 2017, Adani Power would supply electricity to Bangladesh for 25 years. Currently, Bangladesh is importing 1160MW of electricity from India.