Solar energy builders in India have began so as to add battery storage to photovoltaic initiatives to draw consumers and cut back the massive share of curtailments for energy provide that the grids are unable to soak up, Santosh Sarangi, Secretary of India’s Ministry of New and Renewable Vitality, mentioned on Friday.
As a lot as 42 gigawatts (GW) of photo voltaic initiatives are nonetheless struggling to seek out offtakers, with about 18 GW of solar-only initiatives with out batteries most prone to persevering with to battle, Sarangi mentioned on the BNEF Summit in New Delhi, as carried by Bloomberg. Furthermore, one other as much as 15 GW in whole initiatives awarded at excessive costs additionally danger failing to safe consumers, in keeping with the official.
With out battery backup, photo voltaic initiatives see curtailments through the hottest months and peak daytime hours.
India’s electrical energy grid is increasing at a slower tempo than the increase in renewable vitality installations, resulting in an elevated share of clean energy curtailments and threatening to gradual the photo voltaic and wind increase on the earth’s most populous nation.
Grid and transmission constraints accounted for almost two-thirds of all renewable vitality curtailment at 300 gigawatt-hours (GWh) within the first quarter of the yr, clear vitality suppose tank Ember mentioned in a report in Might.
In a separate evaluation in June, Ember mentioned that India wants round 10 GWh of battery storage immediately to cease renewable vitality curtailment when the coal fleet can not ramp down under its technical minimal.
“With out enough flexibility, together with storage, this might change into a constraint on the following section of renewable vitality development,” mentioned the report’s writer, Neshwin Rodrigues, Senior Vitality Analyst at Ember.
Between April and June, the most well liked months of the yr in India, the nationwide grid wasted 11% of the solar power output at the same time as electrical energy demand jumped to a brand new file excessive. The nationwide grid failed to soak up 8 billion kilowatt-hours (kWh) of photo voltaic vitality in comparison with 63 billion kWh that reached the grid, mentioned Shripad Yesso Naik, Minister of State within the New and Renewable Vitality Ministry.
By Charles Kennedy for Oilprice.com
