Mancheswar railway workshop to install solar power plant

East Coast Railway’s (ECoR) Carriage Repair Workshop at Mancheswar here would have a solar power plant by the end of this financial year to produce green energy in order to meet its power demand.Chief workshop manager (CWM) SK Pankaj said they will install a 0.6 megawatt solar plant over 6500 square metre area inside the workshop in public private partnership (PPP) mode at the cost of Rs 5.25 crore. “The project will be executed through PPP mode on open bidding system. We will float the tender on April 7,” he added.

Pankaj said the plant will be set up at the rooftops of the workshop buildings. The lowest bidder will supply, install, commission and maintain the plant for 25 years. It will also bear all the expenditures of the project. After 25 years, he said, the railways will own the plant.”But railways will pay electricity cost per unit to the lowest bidder,” said the CWM and added that the workshop has already installed a 2 KWp solar photovoltaic cell on rooftop of its administrative building.

Pankaj said the workshop has also decided to set up a bacteria generation plant to supply bacteria to be used as ingredient in bio-toilets fitted in green trains. He said bacteria degrade the human feces in the bio-toilets. Later, it turns into water and gas with chlorination and protects the track from direct discharge of shits.”Now the workshop is importing the bacteria from Defence Research and Development Establishment (DRDE), Gwalior, to use it in bio-toilets, but now we will produce it in our workshop by installing a unit,” he said.

Source:TOI