Energetica India Magazine October-November 2021

tion to the Project Closure to bring back the project in line with the Schedule Baseline without changing the project Scope. Fast-Tracking and crashing, these are the two Schedule Com- pression Techniques for any project. Fast tracking always per- form activities in parallel without any addition of Resources but Crashing perform activities in sequence by including addition- al resources to reduce the Project Schedule. Adequate resources (machinery, manpower & money) should be provided to compress time schedule of Erection & Com- missioning. Modern erection techniques should be followed where as far as possible assembly work is done on ground level and heavy capacity cranes are used to lift the same and erect. Again, auto / semi-auto mode of welding method is to be followed for penstock site welding / erection. For example, Radial Gate / Surge Shaft Gate Embedded Part work should start early along with stage wise completion of civil work. Work during monsoon period can be carried out by using suitable barge and floating crane resulting utilization of 3 to 4 months of idle time. Furthermore, early commissioning may be achieved by erection of necessary & sufficient nos. of Hydro Mechanical items in the system. Work of Balance items may be completed later suitably even when generation and revenue earning have already started. Following above concept / plan / modality, HM Erection & Com- missioning time schedule can be reduced by 40 - 50%. There- by, overall time schedule of Hydro Project will reduce around 15-20 %. The cost against additional resources to achieve the same is marginal compared to benefits accrued towards early revenue earned. 4. Conclusion and Remarks Time is the essence of any hydro power plant and as such based on the defined opportunities, the following recommen - dations are proposed. First, linkages between government’s strategy to promote eco- nomic growth and government’s objective to reduce poverty should be made more explicit in terms of policy formulation and implementation. The establishment of Poverty Reduction Fund (PRF), for instance should be accompanied with structur- al measures to address poverty linking government revenues from hydropower with government expenditure in relevant sec- tors (health and education). Second, in line with the basic principles in the country’s nation- al socio-economic development plans (decentralization, good governance), it is proposed that the issue of public participa- tion in hydropower development projects to be mainstreamed as part of general awareness campaign. Local population and potentially affected people should be made aware about the existing rules and procedures in hydropower development in relation to their rights and access to natural resources (land, water and the environment). Currently, this awareness raising took place within each individual project set-up, conducted un- der the leadership of private sector actors (the respective pow- er companies). While this current set-up indirectly obliges pri- vate sector actors to follow the defined rules and procedures, it also highlights the potential conflict of interest that might occur when private sector actors become the only de-facto decision maker in shaping the overall process of public participation. The proposed awareness raising program could be initiated at district and provincial level, with involvement from district/ provincial government, civil society groups and others with di- rect access to village communities where hydropower projects were proposed or planned. Elements of the awareness raising program should include basic information with regard to proj- ect procedures and rules in relation to compensation arrange- ments, formulation of mitigation and environment management plan. Last but not least, this awareness raising program should be structurally supported by better information disclosure ap- plied by government agencies at different administrative lev- els. Third, Govt. policy formulation and review should be incorpo- rated into the project’s feasibility studies. While the incorpo- ration can be considered as a structural issue, its application does not require structural revision of the existing policies and legal framework. Current policies, rules and regulations can still be applied accordingly. The idea to change the sequence of hydro project review should be presented to the relevant government agencies in hydropower development. Fourth, in line with the issue of land titling it is suggested that the provision of sufficient budget to ensure the completion of current land titling program in the rural area. Furthermore, it is also proposed the incorporation of the agency responsible for approving land concession as part of the negotiation pro- cesses in the different stages of hydropower development (i.e. concession agreement, project development agreement). Finally, the technical knowhow and Schedule Compression Techniques (Fast-Tracking and Crashing) discussed in this paper should be implemented for accelerated completion of hydro power project. HYDRO POWER 20 energetica INDIA- Oct-Nov_2021