Indian Wind Power Windergy India 2022
About the Event
Greetings from IWTMA!
We are living in times with unprecedented opportunities. While there will be challenges along the way, it is heartening to have the new and bold pledge of India to achieve 500 GW renewable energy capacity by 2030 and to become net carbon neutral by 2070. It is my firm belief that wind energy and green hydrogen will play a great role in meeting our county’s climate and RE targets.
Recent Highlights
• The recent Union Budget presented by the Hon’ble Finance Minister for FY 2022-23 had no significant positive announcements for the wind energy sector. As expected, Government of India withdrew the Concessional Customs Duty (CCDC) on wind components which were available to the sector for over two decades. The industry has responded well and continues its push towards ‘Make in India’ or ‘Atmanirbhar Bharat’. However, the industry will make a representation to the Government on the continuity of CCDC for items that are currently not manufactured in the country or items that cannot be manufactured in the country such as Balsa Wood, Pultruded Carbon Fibre Rods and Permanent Magnets.
• The recent conflict between Russia and Ukraine has pushed the price of crude oil to USD 110 per barrel which will have a ripple effect on petroleum products and result in increase of commodity prices. While this may impact our own profitability and supply chains in the short term, it also goes to show that Renewable Energy is a fitting answer to all such challenges in the long run.
Need for conducive policy framework
• To stop reverse bidding with immediate effect – Last five years have clearly shown that reverse bidding is detrimental to the interests of the wind energy sector. We should have transparent and closed bidding process where each bidder has to submit tariff only one time. Further, the bidding process must facilitate optimum utilization of all seven windy states with different PLFs so that 15 GW of installed capacity can come up per annum.
• PLI scheme across the entire manufacturing value chain for wind energy - Aggressive bidding and lowering of tariff has forced OEMs to introduce new models in quick succession with target of achieving lower LCoE. This results in high costs of R&D, tooling and technology for OEMs. Each new model introduced also has a cascading effect on the corresponding components manufacturing which is mostly carried out by the MSME sector. It has become imperative to support domestic manufacturing and for that purpose PLI across the entire manufacturing chain is required especially for new and larger turbines.
• The domestic market for Wind Energy continues to suffer with procurement restricted to SECI auctions. Open Access with ISTS waiver for captive, sale to exchanges and sale to C&I customers has not yet become operational. Mandatory enforcement of RPO with penalty mechanism is needed. Uniform wheeling and banking charges to be decided by Central Government for all the seven windy states. Renewable Energy generated electricity sales to be brought into GST regime with uniform GST rate to close the loop and enable pass through.