The Agar Solar Park is a proposed 550MW photovoltaic power plant planned to be developed in Madhya Pradesh, India. Credit: Komsan Loonprom / Shutterstock.
The solar park will have a 200MW unit and a 350MW unit. Credit: Indian Renewable Energy Development Agency Limited.
The 350MW unit will be built 8.3km away from the town of Susner. Credit: Indian Renewable Energy Development Agency Limited.

The Agar Solar Park is a proposed 550MW photovoltaic power plant development in the Agar district of the state of Madhya Pradesh, India. It will be developed by Rewa Ultra Mega Solar Limited (RUMSL), a joint venture of Madhya Pradesh UrjaVikas Nigam (MPUVN), and Solar Energy Corporation of India (SECI).

The Agar Solar Park is part of a mega-project, involving the development of 550MW Agar Solar Park, 500MW Neemuch Solar Park and 450MW Shajapur Solar Park in Madhya Pradesh.

A request for proposal (RfP) for the project was released by RUMSL in January 2020 while the reverse auction for the three parks is set to be held in February 2021. The final environmental and social impact assessment (ESIA) report for the project was published in October 2020. The three solar parks are expected to be completed by July 2022.

Agar Solar Park location

The proposed 550MW Agar Solar Park will be developed in two divisions (tehsils) in the Agar district with two units due to land constraints. The total land requirement for the development of the solar park is 1108.63ha.

The 200MW Agar unit (unit four) of the Agar Solar Park will be located approximately 12.7km away from the town of Agar. Accessible via State Highway 27, the proposed site has an approach road, which is approximately 5m wide.

"The Agar Solar Park is part of a mega-project, involving the development of 550MW Agar Solar Park, 500MW Neemuch Solar Park and 450MW Shajapur Solar Park in Madhya Pradesh."

The 350MW Sunser unit (unit five) of the Agar Solar Park is approximately 8.3km away from the town of Susner. The location is accessible via the State Highway 14 from the Susner town and also via the Palda- Pipalaya Nankar village road, which bisects the proposed land.

Agar Solar Park details

The Agar Solar Park will use solar photovoltaic modules based on poly / monocrystalline and / or thin-film (CdTe) of different rated capacities. The solar panels will be installed with a fixed tilt and a single-axis tracking module mounting structure.

The power conditioning unit (PCU) will feature 2,500kW-rated inverters manufactured by Toshiba Mitsubishi Denki Sangyo Shisutemu Kabushiki-gaisha (TMIEC). The inverters will be connected to 33kV outdoor air-insulated substations. Two 33/220 kV pooling substations will be developed with one pooling station at each unit. Control rooms will be established to collect data on monitoring, forecasting, scheduling, and dispatching for the submission to the load dispatch centre. The main control building will also be built to house the switchgear room, supervisory control, and data acquisition (SCADA) / control room, telecommunication infrastructure, and the battery / auxiliary room.

Power evacuation

A 220/400kv interstate transmission system (ISTS) substation, to be owned by the Power Grid Corporation of India Limited (PGCIL), is proposed to be constructed in the village of Pachora to evacuate the power produced from the two units of the Agar Solar Park. A 220kv single and double circuit transmission line will be installed to connect the pooling substations to the grid substation.

The 1.23km-long 220kV single circuit transmission line from unit four will be interconnected with the transmission line of unit seven at Shajapur Solar Park. A 1.23km-long double circuit line will provide connection up to the ISTS substation of PGCIL. Unit five will be connected to the ISTS substation directly via a 29.5km-long single circuit 220kV transmission line.

Financing details

The project secured a loan from for the World Bank via the Indian Renewable Energy Development Agency Limited (IREDA) to finance the development of internal evacuation infrastructure.

Key players and contractors involved

Power Grid Corporation of India Limited (PGCIL) is the project management consultant for infrastructure development.

The EISA report was prepared by the Environmental Resources Management (ERM) India.