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Demand Aggregation for Rooftop Solar: Importance and Its Benefits

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  The Government of India has set an ambitious target of 100 GW solar energy by 2022 - 60 GW of utility-scale solar installations and 40 GW of distributed rooftop photovoltaic (RTPV) installations. While the utility solar segment in India has seen rapid growth with a capacity addition totaling 32 GW (as of Mar 31, 2020), the rooftop segment has seen the addition of just 2.5 GW in the same period. The aggressive subsidization has played a significant role in improving the installations of RTPV systems across the country. Despite this, the target of 40 GW is almost certainly likely to be missed. The reasons behind the slow growth of rooftop solar segments are affordability, lack of standardized products, lack of consumer awareness, and financing. To speed up the installations of RTPV systems among the residential, commercial, and industrial segments, all these challenges need to be addressed. Several solutions have been proposed to overcome these obstacles & one such method is ...

How Demand Aggregation Rooftop Solar Helped in Expediting India’s Rooftop Solar Installation?

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Rooftop solar projects in India have not encountered a high growth rate as compared to ground-mounted solar projects. Aggregate rooftop solar installations in the year 2019 were 5.440 GW along with a cumulative installed solar capacity of 35.7 GW. Rooftop solar has been maintained at ~10% share of overall solar capacity. This is much lower than other key markets such as the US, Germany, China, Spain, and Australia. What Are the Challenges? The average development of rooftop solar installations in India has been a concern for policy makers. There are various reasons for modest uptake of grid-connected rooftop solar in India such as: Installation approach adopted by individuals Absence of asset securitization Non-bankable PPA High transaction costs for the developers etc. How to Overcome Obstacles? One way to overcome the challenge can be demand aggregation. Aggregating the demand can accelerate the uptake in geography.  Secondly,   marketing, lead generation, and t...

Demand Aggregation Rooftop Solar: To Meet India's Rooftop Solar Capacity Target

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The Government of India has set an ambitious target to drive the shift towards renewable energy. In this regard, the government has targeted to achieve 100 GW solar capacity deployment by 2022 to achieve energy security from its abundant untapped solar resource.   With regards to solar energy, the 100 GW target by 2022 consists of 60 GW for utility-scale solar and 40 GW of rooftop solar. Heretofore, proactive measures by the government have made it possible to get closer to the utility-scale target. On the other hand, the rooftop solar photovoltaic (RTPV) sector has seen slower progress despite high subsidies and incentives to consumers. Since the industrial and residential sectors cover more than half of total electricity consumption nationwide and have considerable roof area, these can be focused to meet the targets. The RTPV sector is facing many challenges such as:          Affordability among weaker economic segments   ...

Rooftop Solar And SUPRABHA

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The Government of India (GoI) has targeted to achieve 100 GW solar capacity deployment by 2022 to achieve energy security from its abundant untapped solar resource. In concurrence, facilitated measures by the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) have thus far enabled to achieve close to 39 GW deployment till June 2020 with an additional 35 GW in the pipeline. However, out of the achieved capacity, the contribution of rooftop solar (RTS) is relatively low compared to ground-mounted solar. Several initiatives have been undertaken to give impetus to the RTS sector such as central financial assistance, concessional financing and technical assistance supports to states. The recent MNRE Phase-II Rooftop Solar Scheme is a progressive step in energizing the sector by incentivizing utilities to take a leading role in RTS development and adopting a renewed focus on the previously underserved residential sector. To support the path laid by MNRE and to enable a holistic development of ...