Apart from promoting large utility-scale renewable energy projects, India is at the forefront of extending the focus to innovative renewable energy programmes to leverage the changing technologies and meet the ambitious goal of 500 gigawatts (GW) of renewable power generation by 2030, says Praveer Sinha, MD & CEO, Tata Power Company (TPC).
"Many of the countries only talk about it (energy transition) but have not done any concrete steps, whereas the Indian Government took the policy initiatives and supported us in this ongoing transition," he said in an exclusive interaction with Fortune India.
The technologies used in this energy transition are cost-competitive.
These are multiple technologies like sodium batteries, manganese batteries, flow batteries, zinc batteries and the like.
Praveer Sinha says India's renewable energy capacity addition plans are going in the right direction.
Apart from promoting large utility-scale renewable energy projects, India is at the forefront of extending the focus to innovative renewable energy programmes to leverage the changing technologies and meet the ambitious goal of 500 gigawatts (GW) of renewable power generation by 2030, says Praveer Sinha, MD & CEO, Tata Power Company (TPC).
"Many of the countries only talk about it (energy transition) but have not done any concrete steps, whereas the Indian Government took the policy initiatives and supported us in this ongoing transition," he said in an exclusive interaction with Fortune India.
New initiatives like the KUSUM program to solarise agriculture pump sets, the PM Surya Ghar program to solarise one crore households in the first phase, focus on solar-wind hybrid, floating solar, Fixed Duration Renewable Projects (FDRE), utility-scale Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS) and Pumped Hydro Storage projects are examples of this transition happening in the country.
The technologies used in this energy transition are cost-competitive. Since raw materials like wind and solar are used for generating power, prices will not increase for the next 20-25 years, unlike in the case of fossil fuels like coal or gas. At the same time, at least half a dozen new battery technologies are coming up other than the current lithium-ion batteries. These are multiple technologies like sodium batteries, manganese batteries, flow batteries, zinc batteries and the like. In the world of nuclear energy, at some stage, small modular reactors will emerge instead of setting up huge reactor plants. "We live in a world where energy transition and climate change are a reality and have to move in that direction with focus and without knee-jerk reactions to reach goals," says Praveer Sinha.
Praveer Sinha says India's renewable energy capacity addition plans are going in the right direction. The country already generates 15-16% of energy needs from renewable sources from virtually nil capacity 15 years ago. This is likely to become 45-50% by 2030. "In 2023, India added 18 gigawatts (GW) of renewables and in 2022, we added 13 GW. From 2025-2026 onwards, we will be adding about 30-35 GW a year and this addition will not only take care of the future demand increase but also will replace many of our existing brown coal-based projects with clean power," says Praveer Sinha.
