Patel Engg nears land buys for power plants

Patel Engineering, the Mumbai-based construction firm, would soon acquire land for its two power projects in Tamil Nadu and Arunachal Pradesh, Ashwin Parmar, director of business development, said.

He said the five acres required for the 120 megawatt Gongri hydropower project in Arunachal Pradesh have been acquired and the final process will be completed in a couple of days. “We need 20 acres for the 1000 (2x500) mw thermal power project at Nagapattinam in Tamil Nadu and we should acquire it by the end of this quarter,” Parmar said.

The Gongri project is worth Rs 800 crore and the Nagapattinam project Rs 5,500 crore.

Ashok Chugh, chief financial officer, said the detailed project reports are being fine tuned. “We should tie up the debt portion in 2-3 months,” he said.  Parmar said work on the Tamil Nadu project would begin next quarter.

“The Gongri project will take another two quarters.” He said the company would spend Rs 25 crore each on the projects this fiscal. Both the projects are expected to be commissioned in 3-4 years. Patel has put in bids for two hydro projects in Himachal Pradesh with a capacity of less then 100 mw each.