Kanpur plans an environment friendly step

In a first of its kind measure in the state, the Kanpur Municipal Corporation (KMC)has moved a proposal to improve energy efficiency in street lighting by handing over the management and maintenance to a public-private-partnership (PPP). As part of the move to improve efficiency,the corporation has envisaged the replacement of almost 50,000 sodium lights with LED lights in the city ,which spans over 260 sq km. This, say officials,will not only save power but also cut down drastically on the present power bill. "At present, street lighting in the municipal area is billed at Rs 18 crore. Rs 2 crore is spent on replacing around 30% of the lights every year and an additional Rs 2 crore is spent on O&M cost for existing lights. This brings the annual electricity bill to Rs 22 crore.Once we replace the lights, we would be saving almost 40% of the power bill," said Alok Ranjan, principal secretary of urban development in the state government.
Indeed the KMC's idea has ostensibly caught the imagination of the senior administration in the state and moves are afoot to engage consultants empanelled with theBureau of Energy Efficiency (BEE) to make a detailed project report and prepare bid documents before the project is handed over to BEE qualified energy saving companies (ESCOs)."We hope to appoint a consultant within a fortnight and thereafter hand over the project to the selected bidder in the next 3-4 months,"said Ranjan.
According to sources,the project is estimated to entail an investment of Rs 66 crore and would take two years for completion.