Indian government committed to promote use of solar rooftops

While sunny weather brings with it alarming warnings about slathering yourself with sunscreen from dawn to dusk, it can soothe your purse strings when you have a rooftop solar panel to harness the sun’s energy.

According to the latest available data, India on an average gets an overall of 5,000-trillion KW of solar energy yearly. In India, the commercial users primarily drive the installation of rooftop solar panels and the count of residential users is seen to be rising at a steady pace. Realising that the enhanced use of rooftop solar panels can help meet the energy crisis in India, the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs last year gave its green signal to scale up the budget to Rs 5,000 crore to boost the implementation of Grid Connected Rooftops systems until 2019-20. Prime Minister Narendra Modi heads the committee. Placed under the National Solar Mission (NSM), the investment is expected to offer support to 4200-MW Solar Rooftop systems installation in the country during the next five years.

While 30% capital subsidy will be offered to the general category states/UTs, the special category states such as Sikkim, Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir and Lakshadweep, Andaman & Nicobar Islands is slated to receive 70% subsidy. The commercial and industrial establishments operating in the private sector won’t receive any subsidy due to the fact that these units leverage other benefits like boosted depreciation, custom duty concessions, excise duty exemptions and tax holiday etc.  

The 4200-MW Solar Rooftop systems installations will enjoy support from the government, residential, social and institutional domains. The commercial and industrial space will be needed to go for the solar rooftop systems without subsidy. This move will help ensure balance capacity via market mode to attain the 40,000-MWp goal by 2022.

Recently, India has escalated the National Solar Mission (NSM) goal to 1,00,000 MWp from 20,000 MWp by the year 2022, out of which the 40,000 MWp is expected to come from the grid-connected solar rooftop systems.

There’s no denying that there is a robust potential available for solar power generation in India making use of the unutilised space on the building rooftops. It would be appropriate to say that the solar power generated by the different type of buildings (commercial, residential, institutional etc) leveraging the solar rooftop systems can be successfully used to meet the building occupants’ requirements.

It is possible for India to attain solar power generation leveraging solar rooftops at nearly Rs 6.50/kWh, which more pocket-friendly option compared to the diesel gen-sets based electricity generation. Industry insiders vouch for solar energy use as it is high on affordability and cheaper than the price at which DISCOMs offer power to different stakeholders (commercial, industrial and domestic consumers).

Fore more information about: Why India Inc should consider leveraging solar power

Reports suggest that a rooftop project in India demands 100 sq per kilowatt space with no maintenance cost. Also, the solar rooftop panel and the installation of the corresponding network is being implemented for one residential unit in India.

In simple words, India is fully committed to curtail the negative effects of climate change and making necessary changes to emerge as a key solar player in the global arena.