SUCCESS STORY OF SOLAR PARKS IN INDIA

The National Solar Mission (NSM) was launched in 2010 as a major initiative of the Government of India with active participation from states to promote ecologically sustainable SUCCESS STORY OF SOLAR PARKS IN INDIA growth while addressing India’s energy security challenges. It will also constitute a major contribution by India to the global effort to meet the challenges of climate change. The mission targets include deployment of 20,000 MW of grid-connected solar power by 2022 to be achieved in three phases which include 2,000 MW of off-grid solar applications including 20 million solar lights by 2022 and 20 million sq. m. solar thermal collector area. The first phase (up to 2013) focussed on promoting scale-up in grid-connected solar capacity addition of 300 MW through a scheme of bundling with thermal power. In the second phase (2013–17) capacity addition of 3,000 MW under the Central scheme was envisaged through various schemes. In the third phase (2017–22), the target up to year 2022 of 20,000 MW or more was to be decided dependent on the experiences and learning of the first two phases. Further, on June 17, 2015, The Government of India revised the NSM target of grid connected solar power projects from 20,000 MW by year 2022 to 100,000 MW by year 2022. The government has planned to achieve the target of 100 GW by setting up distributed rooftop solar projects and medium & large scale solar projects; the year-wise break-up of capacity has been shown in Figure 1.

MAJOR SCHEMES OF THE CENTRAL GOVERNMENT

The government of India has launched several schemes to achieve the target of 100 GW. The details of major central schemes are as given in Table 1. Table 1: Details of schemes for promotion of solar energy

THE CURRENT STATUS OF SOLAR PARK DEVELOPMENT IN INDIA

The Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE), Government of India, is already implementing a scheme for development of solar parks which was launched in December 2014. The capacity of the solar park scheme has been enhanced in February 2017 from 20,000 MW to 40,000 MW after considering the demand for additional solar parks from the states. All the solar parks are targeted for completion by 2019/20. As on August 2017, 36 solar parks in 21 states with an aggregate capacity around 21,000 MW have been approved which are at various stages of development. Solar projects of aggregate capacity 2,151 MW have already been commissioned in 5 Solar Parks up to August 31, 2017 as shown in Figure 4.

The total capacity when operational will generate 64 billion units of electricity per year which will lead to abatement of around 55 million tonnes of CO2 per year over its life cycle. It would also contribute to the long-term energy security of the country and promote ecologically sustainable growth by a reduction in carbon emissions and carbon footprint, as well as generate large direct and indirect employment opportunities in solar and allied industries, such as glass, metals, heavy industrial equipment, etc.

Article Courtesy :Shri Radhey Shyam Meena, Shri Dilip Nigam, Shri S K Gupta, Shri A S Parira, Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE), Government of India, New Delhi; and Dr A K Tripathi, National Institute of Solar Energy (NISE), Gurugram, India. Email: rshyam.mnre@gov.in