India’s largest floating solar plant comes up in Kerala

Thiruvananthapuram, December 6: Here is the India’s largest floating solar plant and it's set up on the Banasura Sagar reservoir in Wayanad, Kerala. Good work Kerala! 

 

Inaugurating the solar plant, State Power Minister MM Mani said that there was a need for find more energy to power the state's growth and development.”

 

The solar power plant that floats on the surface of water has a capacity of 500 kilowatts (KW). This is the country's largest floating solar plant," the official release issued by Kerala State Electricity Board read. The solar plant installed on 18 floating platforms, consists of 1,938 solar panels with a capacity of 260 watts, a 500 kilo volt ampere (KVA) transformer and 17 inverters.

 

"The unique feature of this floating solar plant is the anchoring mechanism used by the overwhelming technology to maintain the plant with the alteration of the water level," the official statement read. Constructed by the Thiruvananthapuram-based Ad tech Systems, the plant will generate 7 lakh units of power in a year. The private firm has also offered to provide two-years of free maintenance work at the plant. The total cost of the project is Rs. 9.25 Crore.

 

Floating solar plants had higher efficiency compared to ground-mounted installations due to the moderating effect of water bodies on panel temperature.