According to the recently released statement by the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy, India has already achieved the target of sourcing 40 per cent of energy from non-fossil fuel sources in 2021. The ministry said, “At COP-21, as part of its NDCs, India had committed to achieving 40 per cent of its installed electricity capacity from non-fossil energy sources by 2030. The country has achieved this target in November 2021 itself.”
The Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) with total non-fossil based installed energy capacity was 157.32 gigawatts (GW). This is 40.1 per cent of the total installed energy capacity of 392.01 GW.
India’s Renewable Energy Capacity
At present, India’s installed Renewable Energy (RE) capacity stands at 150.54 GW, which includes solar at 48.55 GW, wind (40.03 GW), small hydropower (4.83 GW), bio-power (10.62 GW) and large hydropower (46.51 GW) as of November 2021. The nuclear energy-based installed electricity capacity stands at 6.78 GW.
“In line with the Prime Minister’s announcement at the recently concluded CoP26, the Government is committed to achieving 500 GW of installed electricity capacity from non-fossil fuel sources by the year 2030,” the ministry added.
During the last 7.5 years, India has witnessed the fastest rate of growth in renewable energy capacity addition among all large economies, with renewable energy capacity (including large hydro) growing 1.97 times and solar energy expanding over 18 times.
Investment in Renewable Energy in India
India’s renewable energy programme is driven by private sector investment. As per REN21 Renewables 2020 Global status Report , during the period 2014 -2019 renewable energy programmes and projects in India attracted an investment of US$ 64.4 billion. In the year 2019 alone, US$ 11.2 billion were invested. New opportunities have emerged, and altogether new business space has been created. Indian companies have begun to explore foreign stock exchanges as a source of funds. India is progressively becoming a favoured destination for investment in renewables.
As per Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) data Cell, DPIIT, the Indian ‘Non-Conventional Energy’ sector received approximately US$ 7.27 billion as FDI from the year 2014-15 up to June 2021. Of this, an FDI of US$ 797.21 million was attracted during 2020-21. Liberal foreign investment policy allows the foreign investors to enter into joint ventures with an Indian partner for financial and/or technical collaboration and for setting up renewable energy-based power generation projects. Up to 100 per cent foreign investment as equity qualifies for automatic approval, under the extant FDI policy of the Government.
