KOCHI: The Kochi Corporation should withdraw from the Rs 295-crore waste-to-energy plant at Brahmapuram to be implemented under a build, operate and transfer (BOT) mode by a company named GJ Natural Care and Energy P (Ltd), according to the district council of the Kerala Electricity Workers’ Federation. The project is a white elephant and the corporation will incur huge losses for bankrolling the project as the Kerala State Electricity Board will not be purchasing power from the project at an average cost of Rs 15 per unit, said the federation affiliated to the pro-CPI AITUC.
It has asked the local body to abandon the project as it would be a huge burden on the corporation already facing severe financial constraints. “The project has been structured in a manner that would cause burden to the local body due to the failure of assured supply of the promised quantity of wastes,” Mr Jacob Lazar, secretary of the federation, said. He added that the corporation will have to foot the power bill partially as KSEB will not be interested in buying power at Rs 15 per unit. “The project in its present form will be worse than the venture at Vilappilsala near Thiruvananthapuram, which was abandoned due to the popular agitation,” he said.
The KSEB is not purchasing power from NTPC in Kayamkulam and BSES at Kochi due to the higher costs, he said. “How can KSEB then buy power at Rs 15 per unit from this project?” he asked. The Kerala Electricity Regulatory Commission is unlikely to provide the green signal for power at such high prices, he added. He also pointed out that the company was not having any previous experience in power generation. The technical partner of the company, Biomas Power Ltd, which claims 35 years of experience was incorporated only on August 10, 2007. It is a general commercial enterprise without any claim on renewable or other forms of energy generation, he added.
