According the Power Minister R.K. Singh, the Indian government is planning to bring a single bid for setting up 25 GW of solar capacity in Ladakh, reported by PTI. This comes across as a highly ambitious plan considering only 24 GW of solar has been installed in the whole country since 2009.

Speaking at the CII’s Government and Business Partnership Conclave, Singh said, “We have 35 GW of installation potential in Ladakh. We will come out with single bid of 25 GW with storage and delivery at Una.”

He added, “We have released a 10 GW solar bid with a manufacturing component. We will deploy more such bids to ensure manufacturing comes to India.”

The minister said that 16 GW of renewable projects are at various stages of development, with about 28 GW of bid – totalling 116 GW. This indicates India will achieve its target of 175 GW of renewable energy before 2022.

However, Mercom reported  recently that this seems unlikely. In the next four years, India needs to install 100 GW of renewable energy capacity to meet the target of 175 GW renewables by 2022. Out of the remaining 100 GW, solar needs to account for 78 GW of power addition.

According to Mercom’s India Solar Project Tracker, just over 24 GW of solar PV projects have been installed across the country, and these include both rooftop as well as ground-mounted solar PV projects.

India’s installed wind power capacity stands at 34 GW, while the goal to achieve 60 GW by 2022.

The government is also discussing having a storage component as part of future renewable bids.

Earlier, the Solar Energy Corporation of India (SECI) issued a tender for the development of two 1.5 MW (AC) solar power projects with Battery Energy Storage System (BESS) at Tangtse and Durbuk in the Leh district of Jammu & Kashmir.

The government is also considering a tariff policy to penalize DISCOMS for unscheduled load shedding. Mercom has reported that Singh recently apprised the Lower House of Parliament through a written reply that said, “There is a provision for imposing penalties on DISCOMs for power cuts not caused by technical faults in the proposed draft amendments to the National Tariff Policy, 2016. The draft amendments are currently under inter-ministerial consultations.”

Nitin is a staff reporter at Mercomindia.com and writes on renewable energy and related sectors. Prior to Mercom, Nitin has worked for CNN IBN, India News, Agricultural Spectrum and Bureaucracy Today. He received his bachelor’s degree in Journalism & Communication from Manipal Institute of Communication at Manipal University and Master’s degree in International Relations from Jindal School of International Affairs. More articles from Nitin Kabeer