India clears ₹68,816-crore 1150 kV transmission corridor, its highest-voltage grid link yet

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India has approved its biggest and highest-voltage power line yet. The National Committee on Transmission cleared a ₹68,816 crore ($7.34 billion) corridor at 1,150 kilovolts, the first of its kind in the country, to carry renewable power from the west to the industrial east.

The corridor's backbone is a double-circuit line from Raigarh Kotra in Chhattisgarh through Rourkela in Odisha to Kolaghat in West Bengal, with new 1,150/400 kV substations along the way. A ±800 kV high-voltage direct-current link, 1,275 km long and rated at 6,000 MW, will run from the Bhadla solar complex in Rajasthan to Raigarh Kotra. The scheme will be built over 72 months through tariff-based competitive bidding, in three parts worth ₹18,000 crore, ₹17,000 crore and ₹33,816 crore.

The committee approved the scheme at its 45th meeting on 9 November, and the minutes were released this week. Its reasoning, in the minutes, is the shape of India's grid in 2031-32: large amounts of new generation in Rajasthan, Maharashtra, Chhattisgarh and the north-east, and bulk demand growth in Odisha and other industrial regions. The line is part of the build-out behind India's target of 500 GW of non-fossil generation by 2030.

The figures come from the committee's own minutes, as reported by The Hindu BusinessLine and the trade publication Power Peak Digest, which agree on the cost, the voltage, the route and the timeline. The approval is a recommendation under the competitive-bidding route, not a construction start: the three parts have yet to be awarded, and no commissioning dates have been published. The $7.34 billion figure is the rupee cost converted at current rates.

The corridor answers the oldest problem in India's energy transition, which is distance. The sun is strongest in the western deserts and the demand is rising in the east, and the existing 765 kV network cannot move enough power between the two. A 1,150 kV line carries far more per corridor, which means less land to acquire and lower losses — but it also means building substations and switchgear at a voltage India has never operated commercially, and that is the part of the plan with no track record.