State government will complete installation of solar panels on the roofs of 1000 schools by this March end and another 1000 by next year, said power and non-conventional energy sources minister Sobhandeb Chattopadhyay in Assembly on Tuesday.
“Solar panels have already been installed in 673 school roofs and effort is on to complete installation in the remaining schools as soon as possible.
We had targetted to complete installation in 1000 schools by this month and have set up a fresh target of 1000 additional schools by next financial year,” said Mr Chattopadhyay.
This apart, solar panels have been installed in 21 colleges and five universities, he said adding the move has brought down the power expenses of the educational institutes immensely.
Plans are also afoot to install ‘floating solar panels’ on the huge water bodies that are present adjacent to the thermal power, power plants of Bakreswar, Sagardighi and Santhaldighi.
Meanwhile, to reduce loss from power theft, the department has come up with a project to insulate the overhead cables from physical pilferage.
Under the project, 100 areas have been identified where theft is prominent and a total of 140 km of Aerial bundled (AB) cables have been introduced in these areas.
The AB Cables are power lines that help in stopping theft as hooking, the most common method of power theft and allows better management of the overhead wires for electricity distribution.
Mr Chattopadhyay further said the department has come up with a master plan to meet the state’s power demand by 2025.
The policy includes a sustainable power development initiative wherein all kinds of conventional and non-conventional energy would be linked to the grid for supplying power as per requirement, he said.