US firm to set up solar power plant in Himachal

SHIMLA - US-based Bergamo Acquisition Corp is eyeing to tap solar energy in Himachal Pradesh, a company’s official said Sunday.

The company has evinced interest in setting up a mega solar thermal power plant with an investment of $400 million near Baddi industrial area in Solan district.

“The company has plans to set up solar power plants up to a total capacity of 1,000 MW across India. Initially, it is going to install a 100-MW solar thermal plant in the Baddi-Barotiwala area,” Hillard Herzog, president and chief executive officer of the company, told IANS.

The firm has set up a joint venture, Bergamo Harbinson Energy Ltd, with the promoters of Esoft Informatics Pvt Ltd, an Indian software company.

Bergamo will have 60 percent share equity and Esoft 40 per cent.

Herzog, who is currently touring India, said the company is also setting up a consumer-cum-retail division in technical collaboration with Suntrough Technologies, a division of Bergamo Acquisition Corp, in Solan town to market its products.

“Solar products like outdoor lights, garden lights and water heaters would be launched by next month,” he said.

Himachal Pradesh has already decided to make Shimla and Hamirpur solar-powered cities with the assistance of the central government.

In both the towns, solar panels would be installed in most of the government buildings for lighting and to heat them up in winter, a government spokesperson said.

The government has also made provisions in the budget to develop two energy parks this fiscal.

The parks would be developed in the campus of Dr Y.S. Parmar University of Horticulture and Forestry in Solan and the National Institute of Technology, Hamirpur.

The government has distributed compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs) to every household free of cost last year. This has resulted in saving of about 270 million units of power worth Rs.100 crore in a year.