Indian Oil (IOCL) petrol pumps powered by solar rooftop systems from Bluebird Solar

(prsubmissionsite) November 11, 2019 – A huge number of petrol pump stations are catering to the fuel demand of the country; however, power shortages have severely affected the reliability and operational efficiency of most petrol pumps. As many petrol pumps are located in either rural areas or outskirts of urban areas where there is always a significant gap between electricity demand and supply. Solarization of petrol pumps is the best solution for such power problems.

Bluebird Solar finds itself fortunate to get impaneled with Indian Oil Corporation Limited (IOCL) and contribute towards its plan to go green by Solarizing its Retail outlets and Kisan Sewa Kendras. With our team of highly qualified and experienced professionals, we have successfully installed more than 260KWp of a rooftop solar power plant at 34 IOCL petrol pumps at various locations in north & east India. In all the rooftop solar power plant installations done at IOCL petrol pumps Bluebird Solar’s 325W polycrystalline solar panel has been used.

Petrol pump owners have immensely benefited by opting for solar power, one of the many reasons is the reduction in their electricity bills and operational cost of diesel generator. In addition to this, the solarization of the petrol pump has delivered a positive message to the customers about IOCL as a responsible business entity. It has also reduced breakdown expenses and facilitated general improvement in sales at solarized outlets by facilitating more seamless services. “Solar is not just about being environment-friendly. It is paying off financially as it helps raise sales as well as bring down the operating cost for petrol pumps,” said AK Sharma, director (finance) at Indian Oil Corp.

A few years ago, Mr.Vikas Sharma, the manager of an Indian Oil filling station at Bhojpur in Ghaziabad, used to lose up to 10 percent of his monthly sales because of long hour power cuts and availability of electricity for only 8-10 Hrs a day, not necessarily during business hours. “Most of the customers are in a hurry, by the time you get your boys to start the backup generator, the customer would have left. That’s the cost one pays daily for being dependent on grid power,” said Mr.Sharma. Sometimes the staff at filling stations is too lazy to even start the generator, knowing the cost of running it would be more than the money made from a motorcyclist wanting to fill Rs.20 worth of petrol.

“All these accumulate into a substantial loss of business in a month,” said Sharma, who installed solar panels in early 2018 at his decade-old pump to the meet fuel demand that’s growing with rising rural incomes and roads getting increasingly better.”This has changed everything for us,” he said.

Mr. S.K. Singh of an Indian Oil Kisan Sewa Kendra located 16.5 KM away from Lucknow got a 10KW off-grid solar power system installed at his filling station. He used to face 5-6 hr long power cut daily and during blackouts, he used to run the pump on a diesel generator that consumed 7.5 Lts. of diesel every day costing him upto Rs.15000 per month. Besides this his monthly expense on electricity bill used to be Rs.10000 per month. After Bluebird solar commissioned a rooftop solar power plant at his place his dependency on diesel Genset came to zero thus saving his expenses of Rs.15000 on diesel and his electricity bill reduced to Rs.7000 per month. This way he is now saving a total of Rs.216000 per year.

Bluebird Solar has been installing solar power projects since 2017 and has an EPC portfolio of 8MW including installed & under execution projects. We have been contributing towards “National Solar Mission” with our products and services and strive to satisfy our customers with the best quality.