The 155-year-old University of Madras would soon become the first state university in Tamil Nadu to be completely powered by solar energy.
This is welcome news with the state facing an acute shortage of electricity over the past few years.
The university, which offers more than 60 post-graduate courses, has five campuses in the city with Chepauk as its headquarters, vice-chancellor Prof. G. Thiruvasagam told Deccan Chronicle on Thursday.
“We have several laboratories in various departments such as microbiology, biotechnology and nanotechnology that require uninterrupted power supply,” he said.
“With frequent power cuts in the departments, research scholars and students are not able to perform some highly sensitive tests in laboratories. So we have decided to install solar power in all our campuses for which we will seek Rs 25 crore from the University Grants Commission (UGC) in the Twelfth Five Year Plan,” the vice-chancellor said.
Prof Thiruvasagam also pointed out that the university had paid `8 lakh per month as electricity charge and would save about `1 crore every year with the installation of solar power in the university.
“We will take guidance from the Tamil Nadu Energy Development Agency (TEDA) for procuring and installing solar power. As we are an education institution migrating from conventional power to solar we will also get subsidy,” he said.
