BHEL aims non-power revenue to 40 pc by 2022

The areas like municipal water, Ganga mission, solar, aerospace, defense and metro and high speed rail projects have been identified as growth drivers.

"Currently, our non-power business is 20 per cent and we are aiming at doubling it to 40 per cent by 2022," BHEL Director Amitabh Mathur told PTI.

"Unless, we take turnkey projects like we do in power, topline will not be high," he said.

Currently, power and associated business contribute 80 per cent of the revenue for the company, while the rest 20 per cent have been generated by the Railways and other electrical products.

The new areas of diversification like municipal water projects, solar, clean Ganga mission, metro projects and high speed trains, aerospace and defense would help the power equipment maker to transform into an engineering powerhouse, the official said.

The power sector remains in stress and with emphasis by the government on renewables, the Central Electricity Authority (CEA) last year had said there was no need for new thermal power plants till 2022.

BHEL had then reacted saying even if new thermal project order might dip, replacement and modernisation projects order book was very strong.

He clarified despite diversification in other areas BHEL remained committed to power.

For capacity building in water projects, BHEL and the National Environmental Engineering Research Institute (NEERI), under the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) had signed an MoU for jointly working on projects related to water and waste water treatment in the municipal segment.

"We are in touch with several municipal authorities like Patna and Varanasi. We are expecting a project in this segment shortly," Mathur said.

It has also planned to collaborate with the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) to enter the maintenance, repair and operations (MRO) business.

BHEl is also eyeing a major role in the Ahmedabad-Mumbai high-speed rail project, popularly called bullet train, ranging from manufacturing coaches, civil construction work to lay down rail lines.