Energy conundrum – Solar power is important for India, but it will not serve every energy need

Source: The post is based on the article “Energy conundrum – Solar power is important for India, but it will not serve every energy need” published in The Hindu on 15^th December 2022.

Syllabus: GS 3 – Environment

Relevance: concerns associated with setting up solar powers

News: India has committed to source nearly half its energy from non-fossil fuel sources by 2030 and source at least 60% of its renewable energy from solar power. However, there are problems associated with generating solar based energy.

What were the plans of the government regarding solar powers and what are problems associated with it?

The government decided to set up large solar parks as small parks lead to higher per-unit production costs.

The government announced the ‘Solar Parks and Ultra-Mega Solar Power Projects’ policy for the creation of large parks in 2014 with an initial plan to set up 25 parks capable of generating at least 20,000 MW by 2019.

The government later increased it to 61 parks with a target of 40,000 MW in 2017.

However, only a fourth of the capacity has been achieved by now which means projects worth 10,000 MW have been commissioned. Four projects have also been cancelled by the Centre due to slow progress.

Further, India had committed to generate 1,00,000 MW from solar power by the end of 2022. However, only around 61,000 MW of such capacity has actually been installed.

There are various reasons behind the slow progress such as challenges in acquiring land, setting up necessary infrastructure, and environmental issues.

What is the way ahead?

These all show that India is lagging behind its commitment and it seems that Solar power may not be enough to cater the demand of the growing India.

Therefore, along with expanding the economy the government should also consider whether renewable power, solar, wind or nuclear will be enough for sustainable economic growth or not.