Gujarat-based Involt Energy has commenced construction of its first solar cell manufacturing plant in Rajkot with an initial capacity of 1.78 GW.

The facility is expected to be commissioned by June 2026.

The company noted that the fully automated, guided vehicle-based facility will utilize the latest TOPCon (Tunnel Oxide Passivated Contact) technology. The 182mm*210mm G12R TOPCon cells will have an efficiency of 25.3% to 25.4% with a maximum power output of 9.5 W – 9.7 W.

Involt intends to expand its manufacturing capacity with an additional 3 GW of solar cell production and 3 GW of wafer manufacturing, aiming to meet the growing demand for renewable energy components in India.

“India’s renewable energy market is expanding rapidly, and advanced technologies like TOPCon will enable us to manufacture world-class solar cells locally, reducing import dependence and enhancing energy security,” said Darshit Bhoraniya, Managing Director of Involt Energy.

The Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) recently mandated that only solar cells manufactured using undiffused wafers will qualify under the Domestic Content Requirement policy, effectively prohibiting the use of “blue” or diffused wafers. This is to ensure that the most critical stages of solar cell manufacturing, such as diffusion, printing, and metallization, are carried out entirely in India to strengthen the domestic solar industry.

India added 25.3 GW of solar module capacity and 11.6 GW of solar cell capacity in calendar year 2024, according to Mercom’s State of Solar PV Manufacturing in India 2025 report. The manufacturing capacity additions in 2024 were primarily driven by demand from the solar project pipeline and the reimposition of the Approved List of Models and Manufacturers (ALMM) order from April 2024.

MNRE issued a draft in September 2024 to include solar cells in ALMM to address the growing domestic production capacity. Projects mandated to use ALMM-enlisted modules (List-I) must ensure these modules are manufactured using cells from List-II, effective June 1, 2026.