Solar power deployment naturally becomes crucial for India as the South Asian nation aims to procure 50 per cent of its energy requirement from renewables and increase renewable capacity to 500 GW by 2030, on its way to carbon neutrality by 2070.
Solar energy remained central to India’s National Action Plan on Climate Change with the National Solar Mission as one of the key Missions. The Mission aimed to install 100 GW grid-connected solar power plants by the year 2022. While the goal could not be reached, India was successful in accelerating its solar growth and market sentiment as the country ended 2022 with over 63 GW of installed solar capacity.
While the government of India and its schemes laid down the path to green transition, the importance of private participation cannot be underestimated either which remained a driving force in India’s impressive solar growth in recent years. While many private companies stepped up for solar deployment feeding India’s growing solar demand, we look at the country’s top solar power developers based on their installed capacity.
Adani Green Energy Ltd
Adani Green Energy Ltd. (AGEL) is the renewables arm of the Adani Group. AGEL, with its aggressive renewable push, currently leads the solar power developers in the country. The firm has recently been ramping up its hybrid power capacity, with the latest, and its third, 450MW wind-solar hybrid power plant commissioned at Jaisalmer in Rajasthan.
The year 2022 saw AGEL stepping up the hybrid power generation capacity of India as it operationalized its first hybrid power plant of 390 MW in May and commissioned one of the world’s largest co-located hybrid power plants of 600 MW in September last year. With that, AGEL now has an operational hybrid power generation capacity of about 1,440MW.
Including in-operation and under-construction projects, the firm has a portfolio of roughly 14,900 MW of solar power and over 2700 MW of hybrid power. The installed operational capacity is over 4800 MW for solar power projects.
ReNew Power
Gurugram-based renewable energy firm ReNew Power is a subsidiary of ReNew Energy Global Plc, among the largest renewable energy independent power producers (IPPs) in the world. ReNew develops, builds, owns, and operates utility-scale wind and solar energy projects hydro projects and distributed solar energy projects.
As of October 2022, ReNew had a gross total portfolio of about 13.4 GWs of renewable energy projects across India including commissioned and committed projects. Recently, the firm announced the installation of India’s first ever 3x platform Wind Turbine Generators (WTG) in Gadag, Karnataka. The WTGs have a nameplate capacity of 3.3-3.465 MW.
ReNew Energy Global PLC commits to hitting net zero by 2040, 30 years ahead of India’s 2070 target and more ambitious than the net zero targets of many global energy companies.
The company boasts a total installed solar capacity of over 3700 MW out of over 7,600 MW operational renewable capacity.
Tata Power Renewable Energy Limited
Tata Power Renewable Energy Limited (TPREL), a subsidiary of Tata Power Company Limited, is not only among the biggest solar power developers but also one of the most significant renewable energy players in the country. It offers green energy solutions for various business segments like utility-scale projects, solar rooftops, and solar pump systems.
As of January 2023, TPREL’s total renewable utility capacity is 6,048 MW, which includes over 2,160 MW projects under various stages of implementation and over 3,880 MW of operational capacity. The company has a solar installed capacity of roughly 3 GW – a part of its total operational renewable capacity of about 3.9 GW.
Further, the company’s solar EPC portfolio is more than 10 GWp of ground-mount utility-scale, over 1.3 GW of rooftop and distributed ground-mounted systems, and over 93,000 solar water pumps.
In a bid to encourage societies to opt for open-access projects to meet their power demands through clean energy, TPREL recently signed an agreement to set up a 3.125 MW group captive solar project to power an apartment complex. The solar project will be set up at Himayatnagar in Maharashtra.
Azure Power
Azure Power is a New Delhi-based developer and operator of utility and commercial-scale solar PV power plants. It has the vision to displace 230 million tons of global emissions by 2030. The company developed one of India’s first utility-scale solar projects in 2009 in Awan, Punjab. In 2022, the firm commissioned a 600 MW SECI project, one of the largest owned and operated single site-solar projects in India.
Azure Power established itself in the industry, becoming one of the biggest solar developers in the country, with a current portfolio of over 7400 MW of pipeline, under-construction, and operational solar capacity.
Azure has a total installed and operational solar capacity of over 2,900 MW. The firm also has over 40 MW of under-construction projects, while 4,470 MW of solar capacity in the pipeline awaits addition to its power portfolio.
Greenko
Headquartered in Hyderabad, Greenko is a signatory to the Climate Pledge with a target to achieve net-zero carbon by 2040 – 10 years ahead of the Paris Agreement. Greenko has one of the largest operational clean energy portfolios in India with about 7.5 GW of installed renewable capacity across 15 States in India. It has initiated Integrated Renewable Energy Storage Projects in several states, including Andhra Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, and Karnataka.
The company is building 50 GWh of storage capacity on pumped storage technology (PSP), as part of its plan to set up an energy storage cloud platform of 100 GWh. Last year, the firm also entered into a strategic partnership with steel producer ArcelorMittal to construct a 975 Mw of nominal solar and wind capacity project for about $600 million.
Greenko has developed, engineered, constructed, and currently operates several of India’s grid parity, utility-scale solar projects. The company claims to have over 2170 MW of installed operational solar capacity with 53 projects commissioned across India making it one of the biggest solar power developers in the country.
