By IANS,
Chennai: Energy and marine power solutions
company Wartsila India Ltd. will shortly beef up its operations and maintenance (O&M) portfolio by adding another 500 MW capacity, taking the division’s total power capacity to around 2,000 MW, an official said.
“We are in the process of adding 500 MW gas based power plants to our O&M portfolio. The plants are located in south India,” James Rajan, vice president, Services told reporters here Wednesday.
According to Rajan, sensors in the power plants will communicate the health of the machine to the company’s data centre. The data will be analysed by the company’s personnel and appropriate suggestions would be communicated to the clients on real time basis.
While RMS will be an added feature for Wartsila India’s O&M division, the company is yet to decide on offering the remote monitoring service to those who have not signed up with it for maintenance.
“Wartsila India has a total installed capacity of around 3,500 MW in India, of which over 1,500 MW is under O&M contract,” said Rakesh Sarin, managing director after launching the company’s remote monitoring station (RMS).
According to him, a flexible hybrid energy solution is what is needed to meet the peaking power demand in the country and gas based plants is an ideal fit for that.
“Base load power demand could be met by thermal power stations. However, the peaking power demand during certain periods of the day could be met with gas-based plants as they can kick in and out at short intervals,” Sarin said.
According to him, availability of gas is not an issue, provided the seller gets the price he demands.
Even if the gas price is high, the blended cost of power (gas plus coal) will not be hugely expensive, Sarin said.