The Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) has announced that regarding its Request for Proposals (RfP) for developing a Long Term Vision, Implementation Plan, Road Map and Institutional Framework for implementing the ‘One Sun One World One Grid’ (OSOWOG) initiative, it has now been decided that the International Solar Alliance (ISA) will be the implementing agency for carrying out all the activities of OSOWOG initiative.
Under its role as the implementing agency, ISA will now handle the bid process management and all subsequent activities of the initiative.
The RfP for the project was first issued by MNRE on May 26, 2020. Subsequently, a pre-bid meeting was held on June 22, 2020, through video conferencing, and around 30 bidders participated in the meeting. Various queries had been received from interested bidders.
However, later the RFP was put on hold till the finalisation of certain administrative arrangements. In its notification, the ministry had stated that “it has been decided by competent authority too put on hold the RFP, for developing a long term vision, implementation plan road map, and institutional framework for implementing the One Sun One World One Grid initiative, on hold until further notice.”
Now, the ISA will issue appropriate corrigendum to the RFP based upon pre-bid queries and invite the final bids.
India’s motive behind the OSOWOG initiative is to take another leap towards building a global ecosystem of interconnected renewable energy resources that are seamlessly shared for mutual benefits and global sustainability.
The OSOWOG initiative (as per the initial RfP) is planned across 3 phases:
- Phase I (Middle East-South Asia-South East Asia (MESASEA) interconnection): Indian Grid interconnection with the Middle East, South Asia, and South-East Asian grids to share solar and other renewable energy resources for meeting electricity needs including peak demand.
- Phase II (Solar and other Renewable Energy resources-rich regions’ interconnection): MESASEA grid getting interconnected with the African power pools to share solar and other renewable energy power of the countries located in solar and renewable energy-rich areas.
- Phase III (Global interconnection): to achieve the One Sun One World One Grid vision.
