The Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) in India has come out with most ambitious capacity addition target of 16,600 MW for renewables this fiscal year.
According to MNRE, during the current fiscal solar capacity is expected to reach its largest-ever capacity addition target of 12,000 MW which would be followed by wind (4,000 MW), bio power (400 MW), small hydro (250 MW) and waste-to-power (10 MW).
The announcement by the ministry is confirmation of the targets mentioned by the Ministry of Finance in the Union Budget for FY2016-17.
The new target is higher than the earlier estimates of the MNRE. In October, a document released by the ministry suggested that around 10.8 GW of solar power capacity could be added in FY2016–2017.
Till now, Indian government has shown strong commitment towards renewable energy and it has started to generate positive results. In the first month of the current fiscal year alone, India added 237 MW renewable capacity out of which 235 MW came from solar. India plans to achieve 175 GW of renewable energy capacity by 2022.
Wind power still dominates the renewable energy sector with 62% share, however, solar is all set to surpass wind sector in the coming years aided by special emphasis and enabling policies. Recently, grid connected solar capacity surpassed 7.5 GW with majority of projects operational in the states of Rajasthan, Gujarat and Tamil Nadu.
Grid-connected solar power capacity additions were more than twice the target for FY2015-16. Against the target capacity addition of 1.4 GW, just over 3 GW of grid-connected solar power capacity was added in India. This was the largest solar power capacity addition in a financial year.
