Food Supplies and Consumer Welfare Minister of Odisha, Krushna Chandra Patra conducted the ground-breaking ceremony for an upcoming mega solar power plant at Neulpoi in Dhenkanal district on Monday.
The project, initiated by WAREE Energies Limited, will be constructed over an area of 595 acres with an investment of Rs 25,000 crore. Additionally, the plant will have a production capacity of 6 gigawatts of solar energy, significantly boosting the region’s as well as Odisha’s growing energy demands.
The plant will manufacture solar panels, modules, and related components and the entire project is expected to create around 14,000 job opportunities.
Speaking at the event, Krushna Chandra Patra, who also holds the Science and Technology portfolio of the Odisha government, emphasized that the project will be transformative to the development of Dhenkanal.
“This project marks the foundation of Dhenkanal’s progress. Thousands of people from the region will be provided with jobs in the plant,” he added.
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Meanwhile, the factory director said that there will be about 14,000 jobs in total. “The jobs will be handed out in phases and there will be close to 14,000 jobs that this project will generate in the next 5 to 10 years,” he stated.
The ground-breaking ceremony was marked with traditional ceremonies in the presence of the factory's director, Hitesh Mehta, who stated that the plant would begin electricity production within the next nine months.
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The mega-solar power plant will be the largest of its kind in Odisha and will massively influence the state’s energy production as well as its shift to green and renewable energy.