Solar energy projects of 9200 MW capacity are being developed under Mukhyamantri Saur Krishi Vahini Yojana 2.0 (MSKVY 2.0) in Maharashtra to provide day time and reliable power supply to farmers for irrigation and under this scheme the first solar park of 3 MW capacity was activated on Thursday in Dhondalgaon village in Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar district. Thanks to Dhondalgaon project 1753 farmers will get day time power supply.
MSKVY 2.0 is being implemented under leadership of Deputy Chief Minister (DCM) and Energy Minister Devendra Fadnavis. This scheme to benefit farmers is the largest distributed renewable energy project in the world. Solar power generation at Dhondalgaon is the beginning of various solar projects being developed as per letter of awards given in March this year to develop solar projects of 9200 MW capacity. Total capacity will be achieved in stages by December 2025, said Chairman and Managing Director (CMD) of Maharashtra State Electricity Distribution Company Limited (MSEDCL) Lokesh Chandra.
The solar energy project which started generation on Thursday is developed on 13-acre public land at Dhondalgaon about 3 Km from electricity substation of MSEDCL. The power utility had given letter of award to concerned company on 7th March 2024 and power purchase agreement was signed on 17th May. The project was developed and activated within four and a half months of power purchase agreement. It is connected to 33 KV substation of Dhondalgaon and it will be useful to provide day time power supply to 1753 agriculture pumps connected to 5 electric feeders. Farmers in Dhondalgaon, Nalegaon, Amanatpurwadi and Sanjapurwadi will benefit from this project.
Hon. DCM Devendra Fadnavis after taking charge on 30th June 2022, had declared ‘Mission 2025’ to solarise at least 30 percent agriculture feeders by December 2025. After that implementation of MSKVY 2.0 was accelerated.
State cabinet under chairmanship of CM Eknath Shinde has recently approved expansion of MSKVY 2.0 to increase capacity by 7,000 MW and take it to 16,000 MW so as to provide day time power to 100 percent agriculture pumps.
In Maharashtra power is supplied in shifts during day and night to agriculture pumps and there is decade old demand to provide only day time power to pumps. MSKVY 2.0 was launched to solve this problem. Under this scheme electricity is generated using solar energy to run agriculture pumps. For this, solar power generation projects are being developed at multiple locations in the state to develop decentralised solar power project. Apart from solving problem of farmers of getting day time supply, this project is also useful in reducing burden of cross subsidy on industry as electricity will be available at cheaper rate.