Need to step up battery manufacturing in India
In an encouraging move for prospects of domestic battery manufacturing, two government run institutions — Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) and Central Electrochemical Research Institute...
View ArticleMSEDCL fights back against rooftop solar
Maharashtra State Electricity Distribution Company (MSEDCL), Maharashtra’s largest DISCOM, has proposed a series of measures to counter growth of rooftop solar in its latest petition to the state...
View ArticleFloating solar slow to take-off
In December last year, SECI announced an EOI for 10 GW of floating solar projects, which was later adopted into the government’s revised 227 GW RE target for March 2022. Several large floating solar...
View ArticleSlow project progress poses a risk to government targets
702 MW of new utility scale solar power generation capacity was commissioned in Q2 2018 taking total installed capacity to 24,941 MW on June 30, 2018. Capacity addition was 11% below our estimate and...
View ArticleTracker market slowing down
In the midst of increasing competition, falling tariffs and shrinking profit margins, the market for solar trackers picked up sharply in India in 2017. Developers were increasingly keen to use trackers...
View ArticleWind sector pick up eighteen months away
India added 1.8 GW of wind capacity in FY 2018 (down 67% over FY 2017). We estimate that capacity addition will further slow down to about 1 GW per annum over the next two years before picking up...
View ArticleGovernment no closer to unlocking the manufacturing puzzle
SECI has made several amendments to its RFS for the integrated project development and module manufacturing tender. The big change is reduction in manufacturing capacity from 5 GW to 3 GW. MNRE...
View ArticleUnremitting price focus a major challenge for the Indian solar sector
MNRE recently advised SECI to revise ceiling tariff downwards in new utility scale solar tenders to INR 2.68 (2.50 without any safeguard duty), a reduction of over 8% on the prevailing level of INR...
View ArticlePower sector reform still a distant dream
The Ministry of Power has proposed a number of progressive ideas for the electricity sector in the form of draft amendments to the National Electricity Act and National Tariff Policy. Proposed...
View ArticleInternational strategic investors hedging their bets in India
Hongkong’s CLP Group has agreed to sell 40% equity stake in its Indian subsidiary, CLP India, to CDPQ, a Canadian pension fund. Meanwhile, Engie has also offered a 50% equity stake to STOA, a French...
View ArticleHaryana’s OA solar market set to take-off
Haryana Electricity Regulatory Commission (HERC) has recently issued regulations that exempt solar power plants from transmission/wheeling charges, CSS and additional surcharge for 10 years from date...
View ArticleTamil Nadu issues a ‘feel good’ draft solar policy
Tamil Nadu Energy Development Authority (TEDA) has released a draft solar policy for comments. The draft policy envisions a total installed capacity of 8,884 MW by 2022; 40% (3,553 MW) of this capacity...
View ArticleSpot price spike unlikely to have any impact on solar power
Spot prices for power on the energy exchange in India touched an all-time high of INR 17.61/ kWh (USD cents 24) last week. Average daily price on October 1, 2018 shot up to INR 7.64 (USD cents 11),...
View ArticleRenewable energy – going through a period of peaks and troughs
Total utility- scale solar and wind installed capacity reached 58 GW on September 30, 2018. Solar and wind capacity individually stood at 24 GW and 34 GW respectively. Last 12 months were notable for...
View ArticleGST problems refuse to go away
Central Electricity Regulatory Commission (CERC) has issued its final decision in response to appeals filed by Adani and Azure against NTPC and SECI respectively for ‘change in law’ compensation claims...
View ArticleOne more extension for the 10 GW integrated solar tender
SECI has again extended bid submission date for the 10 GW integrated project development and module manufacturing tender. Revised date is 12 November, 2018. This is the fifth such extension after...
View ArticleNTPC jumps into the bidding arena
Uttar Pradesh conducted auction for its 500 MW utility scale solar tender on 10 October 2018. Winning tariffs came at between INR 3.17-3.23/ kWh (USD cents 4.4). Capacity was won by NTPC (160 MW),...
View ArticleSolar sector needs robust quality standards
A recent report by PI Berlin, supported by MNRE, NISE, SECI and KFW, has highlighted major risks facing Indian PV projects – sub-optimal design, inadequate EPC contracts, poor installation and lack of...
View ArticleImpressions from an international module conference
I attended one of the world’s leading solar module industry events – PV ModuleTech in Penang, Malaysia – this week. There were about 200 participants from across the world including mainly all leading...
View ArticleRE debt financing gets tougher
RE projects are facing increasing financing challenges. Liquidity in the Indian financial system has dried up considerably pushing up cost of debt finance by 1.0-1.5% over last year. To make matters...
View Article