India’s Solar Outlook 2021

With multiple opportunities emerging in the renewable energy sector in India, the industry seems quite positive towards the outlook for 2021. Moreover, the industry also envisages rooftop solar leading the sector.

India’s renewable energy sector is the 4th most attractive renewable energy market in the world.  India is currently at 136 GW of renewable energy generation capacity and is all set to achieve its 2022 target of 175 GW much ahead of time. It is expecting to be at RE generation capacity of 220 GW by 2022. Lower cost of generation due to deflating cost of solar modules and expected R&D in the sector will further reduce the cost of generation and storage making it more lucrative of investments.

Also, China has recently announced to have 85 percent of their total generation from Solar. And interestingly, Indian government has set an ambitious target of having 450 GW of RE by 2030; this has opened up new and better opportunities for investments in the sector. GOI estimates investments of USD 20 Bn per year to meet this target. This makes 2021 outlook for financing, merger and acquisitions very promising.

Carving a self-reliant future with Solar Energy

Looking at the incessant growth of solar generation scenario in India, the solar energy is the next big thing in the distant future. In addition to that, currently India is at the 6th rank in the solar energy producing country list. MNRE is primarily responsible for R&D, intellectual property protection and international cooperation, promotion and coordination of renewable energy sources such as wind, small hydro, biogas and solar.

According to Dr. Ashvini, Rooftop solar is very interesting concept and it will be promoted even more in the future. “I think rooftop solar with some storage capacities, is probably going to happen as today everyone is using inverters. And also, we should expect some kind of mechanism, and this gives you the independence. Interestingly, we still talk about having surplus energy, whereas, there are users who yet don’t have access to electricity; here, solar can be a breather for them as solar rooftops can give them at comfort by limiting its uses. Considering the geographical challenges, I think not everybody can afford to have them installed in their rooftops. Rather, they can install a mini solar plant in their vicinity.  I would rather call it a solar mini plant instead of solar rooftop.

According to Dr. D.N. Singh, CEO, Bergen Solar Power and Energy Ltd. need to make a beginning. The thing is, we are expert in missing the bus, even in the 12th hour. For instance, when VLSI design and manufacturing came in to the picture, the industry was excited to plan for it but couldn’t do anything.” We did the same thing when telegram revolution came in; we hardly came up with the relevant equipment locally. We must realise that energy is an inescapable need, and people will need it even more in the near future. Moreover, EVs are also coming into the picture, so there will be an increase in the number of electronic gadgets. With this kind developments we would require an energy of around 1000 GW. Here, extracting energy from fossil fuels will be a severe concern. This is why solar energy can play the key role. This is the right place for government’s intervention in creating infrastructural and environmental condition for India.

So, to be more precise, we must identify every minute issue and start addressing them. Also, once we build these facilities we will have a minimum scale which again will be competitive enough- which means, we should be able to export. We must build it the way others have it and the government must play some role in creating a balance for the companies.

“If India has to compete with the global giants like China, we must be ready to have end-to-end raw material with us”, says RohitPandita, Regional Head – Western India, Adani Solar. There was an enquiry floated by the ministry, where they stated that all the PSU’s come into the picture and they should attain appropriate applications on the wafers and poly-silicon among the others. The primary reason for this action was, if the basic raw materials are available in India, all the leading manufacturing players can avail everything right here. But this has to be a collective approach; one company, a single entity or the government alone can’t do it. This can be achieved only when the people or the industry make joint efforts to push.

For instance, China has their own manufacturers for all the products, so in order to kill any market, they will just cut the prices even after implementing the costs of safeguard duty. India was planning to implement it and was progressively working towards implementing it in coming years. China will attempt to safeguard their own manufacturers by providing subsidiaries so that they can enter the market and create a value chain for themselves. I think India must start doing it. Moreover, the government must initiate required measures for the same; and we, as an industry must keep our faith in our government.

According to Govardhan, Founder, President and CEO, Nirvana Foundation “The government will remain diligent towards the industry’s choices and activities. Indian government has been manifesting various initiatives to boost the renewable energy sector. This has imposed pressure on the DISCOMs. The government is trying to bring all the energies under one banner and control them. Government’s push towards the renewable energy is expected to create a balance between the good and the bad. Also, I think there is a need to educate people regarding the benefits of solar, as it will enable them to realise the imperativeness before making their decision. This would generate more dynamics and the government will understand the need – from the user’s perspective also. There must be some communication between the manufacturers and the users as it will enable them to realise the terms to provide relevant services. Moreover, the government policies will support the user and the consumer for better understating towards solar.

Rajinder Kumar Kaura, CMD, Bergen Solar Power and Energy Ltd. wishes to highlight the stand of the capital good for electronics and solar sector. He always believed in collective approach in pulling the energy resources. “We at Bergen have supplied 90 percent of the cell line in India. We have a team of more than 80 engineers who rigorously work towards the research and development of our products.

Talking about the capital goods requirements, I think the government need to focus more on the capital goods. We have been the suppliers of the capital machine for the industry for the last 37 years. These machines were initially started for the electronics industry. I would like to highlight two different aspects to become independent.”

One is supply chain In the supply chain we must first see our stand. We are only manufacturing cells and modules. Cells are being manufacturing at a capacity of 2.3 GW and the modules are manufactured with a capacity of 8 GW, whereas the domestic requirement is of 30 GW. This is a huge gap which must be mitigated with time. And I guess the primary reason for this gap is, India never thought about the actual investments required for the sector’s development.

For example, an investment of 100 Bn $ has been made towards development of 100 GW solar project. Here, the government decided not to impose anti-dumping on China but they welcomed every equipment and placed it at a dumping place where the reverse fitting was introduced even appreciated by the people, but I condemn it as it is the German model which is well tested.  We need to pay for the feeding tariff as incentives.

The government introduced reverse bidding by allowing people to bid the cheapest tariff. This will further allow companies to elevate their capacity at a minimal investment cost, which again is not appreciated. In such times, the government must realise how critical can this be. This reverse bidding has led the Chinese market kill our domestic market by bidding the possible and impossible lowest tariff for the projects and commence a project at a cost of `2., which is against the domestic bidder. The bill of total material of the domestic manufacturers in India, was more than the total selling cost of Chinese companies. So, people prefer to pay low cost and compromise in the quality but will not let the Indian and domestic manufacturers provide you better and long-lasting quality. This was one of the significant reasons for lack of development of localised manufacturing and domestic manufacturing.

Challenges in practicing energy swaraj

Today, the context comes from the policy, and particularly towards the subsidy; and I believe that the solar after 50 years of existence has matured enough to stand on its own without any subsidy. however, governments are willing to promote it. But the kind of money allocated by the government to promote the solar sector won’t be sufficient. With the kind of progress, we are expecting in solar sector we actually need tonnes of money which the governments are never going to have. So therefore, this small money that they throw out actually disrupt the market and therefore becomes a borderline possibility to achieve the target. I request all the governments to stop the subsidy immediately. Me being the Brand ambassador for solar energy of Madhya Pradesh, have reached out to the chief minister of Madhya Pradesh to do that, hopefully some action be taken.

Second, important issue is the provision of free and subsidised electricity. This is one of the critical bottlenecks because the cost complications of solar are highly competitive. Also, we must realise that if keep the open provision of free or subsidised electricity, how will the general public shift towards solar? I think rather than giving subsidised electricity, let us provide them the benefits of direct benefit transfer to the people. Government can make a provision direct transfer of a particular sum amount every month which will let them pay for the electricity consumed. This will let us save a lot of things in response. For example, the Delhi government’s 200 units policies are one of the worst and unappreciated things that can happen as it directly kills solar energy and renewable adoption.

If we consider the world’s situation, eventually, every individual is affected by the lack of energy. I would prefer to say that we need to start putting it on every platform. It’s not just the government’s responsibility in promoting the renewable energy and its benefits, it in fact one of the responsibilities of the public too. Every individual and every household should become independent. The day we cut down our dependence on the government or the companies to meet our energy requirements, that will be the day when we can proudly say that the energy swaraj mission is becoming a reality.

Final Note

We must remember that India is a part of the global network and there are various international treaties, which have to be honoured as a country. And one of the key questions in pushing the domestic content in an unbound manner is the W.T.O. India started with reserving capacities for the domestic manufacturing, and we sadly lost the case. But nevertheless, that this is the opportunity we should definitely capture. And the industry is aligned with everyone with a feeling of creating those capacities as I think this is the right moment where we can actually take some actions towards it. Previously it was quite difficult to get that don’t at a cost of `7 or `18. But now since the cost has come down to around `2 to `3, we should be able to probably we should be able to absorb those kind of price hikes.

So, in a nutshell, industry holds a positive outlook. The industry don’t really see there is any other way like everybody has pointed out, there are various issues like cooking energy is not there, the excess energy access is not there. But I think one solution does not fit all. Probably we are getting into a kind of future where we will have a very big electricity grid, but that will feed to some local smaller grids. And the difference would be in the local smaller grids. There would be some generation capacities. That could be through solar, that could be small hydro, that could be of various options, that model probably will come the only way out is to adopt to all these technologies.

I think rooftop solar/mini solar panels with storage capacities are probably going to be the future trend in the energy sector.

Dr. Ashvini Kumar, Senior Director, renewable Energy Technologies, TERI

Instead of free electricity, government can make a provision direct transfer of a particular sum amount every month which will let them pay for the electricity consumed.

Dr. ChetanSolanki, Energy Scientist, Professor – IIT Bombay

With the government of India’s push towards adoption of solar sector, I think we must have a collective approach towards it and make the dream of Solar India – a reality.

Raj Singh Niranjan, Managing Partner, Trans India Law Associates

We must identify every minute issue and start addressing them. Also, once we build these facilities, we will have a minimum scale which again will be competitive enough- which means, we should be able to export.

Dr. D. N. Singh, CEO, Bergen Solar Power and Energy Ltd.

Government must take more initiatives to boost the domestic manufacturing for solar tenders also, otherwise the domestic market will continue to remain low even in the future.

Rohit Pandita, Regional Head – Western India, Adani Solar

Government need to focus on the capital good for the electrical and solar sector. Moving away from reverse binding process will surely open the market for domestic manufacturers. 

Rajinder Kumar Kaura, CMD, Bergen Solar Power and Energy Ltd.

There is a need to educate people regarding the benefits of solar, as it will enable them to realise the imperativeness before making their decision

B.S. Govardhan, Founder, President and CEO, Nirvana Foundation