"Andhra Sugars believes in sustainable business and hence we opted for solar in our power usage. We appreciate Tata Power Solar’s professionalism and thank them for completing the project in record time.”
- Mr. P Narendranath Chowdary, Managing Director, Andhra Sugars Limited
The Andhra Sugars Limited, one of the largest Industrial houses in Andhra Pradesh, has always focused on using locally available renewable resources to produce value added products, generate employment and upliftment of rural India. With an aim to promote renewable energy, the company has already established wind farms in the states of Andhra Pradesh & Tamil Nadu, and was looking to take a step forward.
Wanting to try a different approach to fulfill its renewable energy purchase obligations (RPO) for their captive consumption, it was time to go solar for Andhra Sugars at their Chemicals & Fertilizers Division at Kovvur in Andhra Pradesh.
Renewable Purchase Obligation (RPO) is the obligation mandated by Central/State Regulatory Commission, mandating a certain percentage of electricity generated / consumed to be from renewable sources.
Andhra Sugars had more than 15 acres of land space available to develop a solar power plant. After a detailed site survey, Tata Power Solar’s engineering team proposed development of a 3 MW solar power plant. While Andhra Sugars only needed to generate 0.5% of the total energy from renewable sources as per the obligation, they looked to further their green targets by opting for a significantly higher share of their energy sources to be powered by solar resulting in optimal utilization of the available area. The 3 MW plant, built as part of the first phase, contributes to more than 15% of their Kovvur plant’s power requirements.
With a very short timeline of 45 days in hand to commission the plant, the Tata Power Solar team immediately got into action and started preparing the site for installation. Site leveling and marking were carried out within the first few days, followed by pile auguring and installation of the module mounting structures. Since installation was in a low lying area and on a filled-up soil, the structure foundations were custom designed to prevent waterlogging from causing any damage to the system. The installation, with the transmission and distribution facilities in place, was completed well within the timeline.
Safety being a focus area and a subject very close to our heart, Tata Power Solar ensured that there were zero incidents reported during the entire installation & commissioning.
The trendsetting system is equipped with the latest inverters, temperature and irradiance sensors to increase efficiency of the project along with data loggers for remote monitoring and real-time support. The system is capable of exporting any excess power to the grid.
