India’s Solar Capacity Addition to Fall by 55% in FY19

However, the rooftop solar market continues to register a robust performance growing at a pace of 70% annually.

Renewable energy consultancy firm Bridge to India has painted a grim picture of the solar industry in the country and has claimed that the solar capacity addition in the current FY will be 55% less than it was in the previous year.

Projected at 4.1 GW, the industry, according to the firm, is facing policy and execution challenge.

“We are witnessing increasing volatility in tender issuance, auctions and capacity addition because of poor coordination between different government agencies and constraints in transmission capacity and land acquisition. The slowdown is worrying for all stakeholders,” Bridge to India managing director Vinay Rustagi said in a statement.

However, the rooftop solar market continues to register a robust performance growing at a pace of 70% annually. This comes despite the slow start that rooftop market witnessed while pursuing government’s target of 40 GW through rooftop solar.

“Unaffected by policy uncertainty and not reliant on land or transmission infrastructure, this market is benefiting from sharp fall in module prices – down 30% in last nine months,” said the firm’s quarterly market assessment report issued on Tuesday.

India is targeting a 100 GW through solar energy by the year 2022 excluding utility scale projects.

However, even after including utility scale projects, the total installation in FY 2018 is projected to be at 4.1 GW, well short of the government’s target of adding 16 GW annually. In FY 2017 India added 9.1 GW of solar capacity.

“Arbitrary ceiling tariffs and poor tender design have resulted in tenders getting routinely cancelled and/ or undersubscribed. As a result, gap between tenders issued and auctions completed has been widening in the last year,” Rustagi said.

Source: ET