Trishuli Galchhi

Summary

Trishuli Galchhi is a 75 MW under-construction low-head run-of-river project on the Trishuli River in Nuwakot, developed by Siddhakali Power within Api Power's portfolio.

75 MW · generation licence recorded · on the Trishuli River · in Nuwakot district. Construction status is tracked separately from the regulatory licence. Nepal's densest river corridor, less than two hours from Kathmandu.

Specifications

Sources

• NEA Annual Report FY 2024/25
• DoED Licensing Directive 2075 — Hydropower Project Licensing

Specifications (Developer / regulatory data)

The Trishuli Corridor — Nepal's Densest River

Trishuli Galchhi sits on the single most hydropower-dense river in Nepal. From the original 24 MW Trishuli plant (1967) to the 216 MW Upper Trishuli-1 upstream, the Trishuli corridor now hosts roughly 540 MW of cumulative capacity across generation-licensed, under-construction, and operating projects — including Upper Trishuli 3A (60 MW), Upper Trishuli 3B (37 MW), and multiple smaller plants. See Trishuli Cascade for the full corridor profile.

The corridor's defining advantage is proximity: the Kathmandu load center is under 50 km away, meaning minimal transmission losses and no dependence on the Khimti–Dhalkebar trunk that bottlenecks eastern-basin projects. Trishuli Galchhi's location in Nuwakot district, directly abutting the Kathmandu Valley's northern edge, makes it one of the most strategically sited projects in the pipeline.

Low-Head Design — a Different Engineering Profile

At 58.5 m gross head with Kaplan turbines and 176 m³/s design discharge, Trishuli Galchhi represents a fundamentally different engineering philosophy from the high-head Pelton plants that dominate Nepal's private IPP pipeline.

What low-head means for this project:

• High unit flow, low head. Unlike a 400 m-head Pelton project that funnels a small jet of water through a narrow penstock, Trishuli Galchhi must move 176 m³/s of water through a large-diameter 8.15 km headrace tunnel. Civil works are proportionally larger — the intake, desilting basin, tunnel diameter, and powerhouse tailrace all scale with discharge volume, not head.

• Run-of-river in the truest sense. A 24.5 m barrage dam with 8 × 12 m radial gates operates as a river-level diversion — no significant storage, no reservoir pondage beyond diurnal regulation. The plant's output tracks river flow almost in real time, making it more exposed to seasonal hydrology than plants with small pondage or peaking reservoirs.

• Lower cost per MW — in theory. At ~NPR 14.40 billion (NPR 192M/MW), the capital cost per megawatt is at the lower end of the benchmark range. Low-head plants trade expensive steel penstocks and surge shafts for large concrete volumes and extensive tunnel systems. The 70:30 debt-equity ratio reflects a conventional consortium structure where lower per-MW cost keeps absolute equity commitments manageable.

• Kaplan turbines for the 2 × 44 MW units are the correct choice for the head range: double-regulated (adjustable runner blades and wicket gates) to maintain efficiency across fluctuating river flows. This is technically sound but adds mechanical complexity and maintenance cost compared to simple Pelton runners.

Api Power's Portfolio Play

Trishuli Galchhi is not a standalone project but part of Api Power Company Ltd's broader portfolio buildout. Through the Siddhakali Power Ltd SPV (~80% Api Power equity), the project sits alongside other Api Power assets including Upper Naugarh Gad (8 MW).

The CARE-NP B- issuer rating assigned to Api Power in 2022 tells the portfolio story. A B- rating — four notches below investment grade — reflects significant financial stress at the holding-company level:

• Multiple concurrent under-construction exposures across the portfolio strain developer equity commitments. A developer simultaneously funding several SPVs faces disproportionate liquidity pressure during construction delays (which Trishuli Galchhi has experienced).
• Concentrated river risk. Api Power's portfolio is geographically concentrated, exposing its aggregate revenue to the same hydrological and regulatory corridor dynamics.
• The ICRA Grade 4 from 2016 pre-dated the financial stress and is now six years stale — it predates the portfolio's construction-phase accumulations and the 2019–2023 interest rate cycle that strained leveraged IPP developers across Nepal.

The Laxmi Bank-led consortium financing structure is conventional by Nepali IPP standards, but the developer's credit profile matters more for construction-phase lenders than for operational-phase debt service. If construction delays compress rainy-season generation before the loan repayment clock starts, the project's economics tighten immediately.

Construction Delay Risk

The original PPA filing set RCOD at May 2020 — a date that has clearly passed without commissioning. Six years from projected completion with no public progress reports suggests at least a 4–5 year delay, consistent with patterns at dozens of Nepali IPP projects that encountered post-2015 earthquake reconstruction costs, COVID-era construction interruptions, COVID-era supply chain disruptions, and the protracted equity-raising timeline typical of lower-credit developers.

No recent progress reports or construction milestone disclosures have been found for Trishuli Galchhi. The absence of contractor information, verified completion percentages, or an updated commissioning target in the public record is itself a data point: projects nearing COD tend to produce disclosure, while projects stuck in mid-construction tend to produce silence.

Cascade Context — Sharing the Trishuli

Trishuli Galchhi shares the river with some of Nepal's most prominent projects:

• Upstream: Upper Trishuli-1 (216 MW) is the cascade's dominant project, with a different developer consortium (Korea South-East Power, Nepal Water & Energy Development Company) and a far more complex engineering profile.
• Parallel and downstream: Upper Trishuli 3A (60 MW) and Upper Trishuli 3B (37 MW) operate in the same reach, with interlinked hydrology.
• Downstream: The original Trishuli plant (24 MW, 1967) is Nepal's second-oldest operating hydropower asset and remains in service under NEA operation — a living piece of Nepal's hydropower history at the bottom of the cascade.

Unlike the Likhu cascade (Trishuli context also described here), the Trishuli corridor is not dominated by a single developer or lending group. It is a competitive corridor with multiple developers, multiple contractor groups, and varying technical approaches — from high-head tunnels (Upper Trishuli-1) to low-head barrages (Trishuli Galchhi) to medium-head plants (3A/3B). This diversity is a strength in normal operations but a coordination challenge during extreme hydrological events where upstream gates affect downstream head.

Limitations & Controversies

The page draws together developer, rating, PPA, and registry context, but public progress disclosures are limited; current construction percentage, revised COD, contractor status, and updated financing position remain unverified here.

See also

• Trishuli Cascade — corridor overview and cumulative capacity context
• Upper Trishuli-1 — upstream 216 MW cascade leader
• Upper Trishuli 3A — 60 MW project in the same reach
• Upper Trishuli 3B — 37 MW project in the same reach
• Trishuli — 1967 original plant, 24 MW NEA-operated pioneer
• Gandaki Basin — basin context