OHPC, World Skill Centre Join Hands To Set Up Green Energy Centre In Odisha
The facility is expected to train around 300 youth every year for jobs such as solar photovoltaic (PV) technicians, operations and maintenance technicians, site supervisors and energy auditors.
Bhubaneswar: Odisha Hydro Power Corporation Ltd (OHPC) and the World Skill Centre (WSC), Bhubaneswar, have joined hands to establish a Centre of Excellence in Green Energy, with an investment of nearly Rs 1.49 crore under OHPC’s corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiative.
The centre, to be set up at Kaushal Bhawan on the WSC campus at Mancheswar Industrial Estate, is aimed at creating a skilled workforce for Odisha’s expanding renewable-energy sector and preparing young people for emerging jobs in solar power and related technologies.
Spread over around 3,000 sq ft, the facility will offer advanced training and demonstration facilities in rooftop solar, floating solar and solar-tracker technologies. It will also provide training in programmable logic controllers (PLC), supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA), industrial IoT, remote monitoring, digital technologies, predictive maintenance, energy management and energy-storage systems.
The facility is expected to train around 300 youth every year for jobs such as solar photovoltaic (PV) technicians, operations and maintenance technicians, site supervisors and energy auditors. It will also seek to promote entrepreneurship and self-employment opportunities in solar installation and maintenance.
The memorandum of understanding (MoU) for the project was signed on Monday by Sandeep Patnaik, Director (HR), OHPC, and Rashmi Ranjan Mohapatra, CEO, WSC.
The signing ceremony was attended by Odisha Deputy Chief Minister and Energy Minister Kanak Vardhan Singh Deo, Minister of State (Independent Charge) for Industries and Skill Development & Technical Education Sampad Chandra Swain, Energy Department Additional Chief Secretary and OHPC CMD Vishal Kumar Dev, and Skill Development & Technical Education Department Commissioner-cum-Secretary Bhupendra Singh Poonia.
The initiative is expected to give youth from districts where OHPC operates access to specialised training in renewable energy and create employment opportunities in a sector that is witnessing rapid technological change.
“The initiative will provide opportunity to the selected youth from the operational districts of OHPC with access to advanced green-energy skilling opportunities, opening pathways to employment, entrepreneurship and self-employment in the emerging renewable-energy sector,” Singh Deo said.
Swain said the initiative would open up new career pathways for Odisha’s youth as the global economy moves towards cleaner sources of energy.
“Energy transition is a reality,” Poonia said, adding that the partnership would help align advanced skilling with the changing requirements of the energy sector.
According to Dev, the shift from conventional to green energy is creating a large pool of new opportunities for skilled workers. “India has set an ambitious target for green energy and we are already working towards it. We are creating new opportunities for the skilled youth of Odisha,” he said.
The partnership comes as renewable energy, particularly solar power, gains greater importance in India’s energy-transition strategy. Besides technical skills, the centre is expected to expose trainees to digital and automation technologies increasingly being deployed in modern energy assets.
“This partnership is valuable because it will build the skilled workforce required in the energy sector,” WSC CEO Mohapatra said.
