India’s National Solar Mission – Grand Plans [20,000MW by 2020]
[In continuation with our coverage on Solar Energy in India, we look at the much awaited National Solar Mission from the government.]
The Union government is supposed to launch the National Solar Mission on November 14, 2009 and here are the guidelines from the final draft
- Make India a global leader in solar energy and the mission envisages an installed solar generation capacity of 20,000 MW by 2020, 1,00,000 MW by 2030 and of 2,00,000 MW by 2050.
- The total expected funding from the government for the 30-year period will run to Rs. 85,000 crore to Rs. 105,000 crore.
- Between 2017 and 2020, the target is to achieve tariff parity with conventional grid power and achieve an installed capacity of 20 gigawatts (Gw) by 2020.
- 4-5GW of installed solar manufacturing capacity by 2017.
Implementation Phases of India’s National Solar Mission
Implementation will be in three phases – first phase (2009-12) will aim to achieve rapid scaling-up to drive down costs.
It will spur domestic manufacturing through the consolidation and expansion of on-going projects for urban, rural and off-grid applications. This will involve the promotion of commercial-scale solar utility plants, mandated installation of solar rooftop or on-site photo-voltaic applications in buildings and establishments of government and public sector undertakings. The target is 100 MW installed capacity here.
Second phase (2012-17) will focus on the commercial deployment of solar thermal power plants. This will involve storage options, and the promotion of solar lighting and heating systems on a large scale in market mode. This will be without subsidies but could include micro-financing options.
Third phase (i.e. 2017- 2020)’s goal is to achieve tariff parity with conventional grid power and achieve an installed capacity of 20 gigawatts (Gw) by 2020.
The mission objective is to drive down the cost of solar energy to as low as Rs. 4-5/Kwh by 2017-20, making solar energy competitive with respect to other fossil fuel based power sources.
Policy & Regulatory Framework of India’s National Solar Mission
The key design principle underlying the regulatory/incentive mechanisms are:
- Feed-in traffic that will be set for various applications by the respective state regulators.
- 10 year tax holiday.
- Custom duty and excise duty exemption on capital equipment and critical materials.
- Use of market based price discovery mechanism
What’s your opinion on India’s national solar mission?
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About the author - Ashish Sinha is a Startup Mentor/Product Strategy Coach, and the founder/chief editor of pluGGd.in.
He has launched/managed couple of products (consumer as well as enterprise) in US and India, and now consults with startups/small businesses on their product/media strategy. He can be reached at: ashish (at) pluGGd.in [+91 98452 06443]
I think the policy push should not be just to install 20GW of solar power but also ensure that we actually produce 20 GW from solar. Government policy and public money will definitely ensure installation, but incentives should be given for production and not installation. What happened in case of wind energy should be avoided in case of solar. Wind power accounts for some 6% of capacity but only 1.6% of production a mere 27% utilization, primarily because the incentives are there for installation but not for production (http://www.peopleandplanet.net/doc.php?id=3357). So even though we have 9.5 GW of installed wind capacity (fifth largest in the world), it is not really helping us in reducing GHG.
Dear Mr Himanshu Sahani
Please check your observation of wind power capacity and production percentage. production is based on plant load factor which is different for different source of energy. For Thermal theoretically it may be 100% as the fuel is in our hand. But in case of hydel, wind and solar the energy source is nature which varies over the time of the year. The unit capacity is designated on maximum generation amount but the generation is dependent on availability of drive source. wind speed varies over the hours but the capacity is designed on some specific wind speed which varies widely
-jana o97484 02910
very good observation Himanshu
But will the govt. guy open their eyes on this?
I think the policy push is really about generation and not only installation. The mission documents talks about generation based incentive (GBI)of Rs.69985.4 crores during the period 2009-2040. So one can only get GBI if one produces electricity through solar energy. For a change, the government guys deserve a pat on their backs.
Hope this governmetn and successive governements are real seriuos and proactive and smart about all this…dont want it to get watered down as other government programs..but the way things are going..looks hopefull. Energy is the key, and we do not want to go the dirty developemnt way…we can actually lead the worls when it comes to generating green power and still continue onthe path of industrialization.
Yes, the Prime Minister has come with an ambitious plan, but he should make sure that India actually produces at least 15,000 MW by 2020. Progress in the area should be validated each and every year so that we can achieve this target and do wonders.
Also if India could produce low cost Solar Panels, all the people will buy them and place them on roof top, so that most of the electricity is generated by these solar cells.
Another thing is India could adopt the technique of Denmark by placing wind mills nearly 1km into the sea.