Aviation: After power bill shock, Vadodara airport turns to solar power

The operations and maintenance of airports are indeed an expensive job. One of the biggest sources of expenditure are the electricity bills every year - huge amounts of money gets drained over this. Vadodara Airport has hence, come up with a solution to this problem. “In order to cut down the cost of the electricity, the Vadodara airport is going to switch over to solar energy for its everyday operations.”  a senior airport official told PTI.

Vadodara airport director Charan Singh said,” The airport is all set to start using clean and green energy for its day to day operations, as its ground-mounted grid-connected solar plant is ready for commissioning." He also added  that the  solar plant will meet 50 per cent requirement of the airport.

 Informing about the source Singh said that  the power will be sourced from a plant located in the airport complex, having a capacity to generate 675 kilowatt (kw) of power. He also informed that it will  help the airport save around Rs 60 lakh every year on its electricity cost. 

 Adding further, Singh said that  Airports Authority of India (AAI) has installed this solar plant for which the contract worth Rs 3.5 crore was awarded to a private company. He said, ” AAI will generate 675 kw of electricity, and also cut the annual electricity cost by around Rs 5 lakh per month.” 

While the Mumbai and Delhi airports are congested and the flights have to hover around these airports to get permissions for landing, he said  "The capacity of the city airport remains underutilised."

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Singh also informed that the  private airline Jet Airways is set to launch flights to Jaipur, Indore, Bengaluru and New Delhi from here soon.