Reliance, Tatas, nine others get Rs 14,000-crore solar PLI approval

Leading energy-sector players like Reliance, Tata Power Solar, and JSW Energy have been allotted sums in different categories in the second tranche of the solar PLI (production-linked incentive) scheme totalling Rs 13,937 crore.

The highest amount, Rs 3,300 crore, has gone to Indosol Solar, a special purpose vehicle of Shirdi Sai, which was one of the winners in the first tranche of solar PLI also. Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL), which has got Rs 3,098 crore, follows.

The newest entrant is US-based solar-panel maker First Solar, which, along with RIL and Indosol, will construct end-to-end polysilicon-wafer-cells-modules (PWCM).

In India, no company manufactures polysilicon, which is raw material in solar equipment manufacturing.

First Solar is Nasdaq-listed and has been operating in India as a supplier for close to 10 years. This would be the company’s first manufacturing facility in India.

Shirdi Sai, which is an incumbent from phase-I, is based in Andhra Pradesh and involved in manufacturing power transmission and distribution equipment.

According to PLI guidelines for the second phase, of the corpus of Rs 19,000 crore, the highest tranche of Rs 12,000 crore has been allotted to end-to-end PWCM manufacturing (raw material to finished products). Unlike the first round, this phase of solar PLI has three schemes – PWCM, wafer-cells-modules (WCM), with an allocation of Rs 4,500 crore, and “cells-modules” (CM) with Rs 3,500 crore.

In the WCM category, Mumbai-based Waaree Energies, Avaada Ventures, ReNew Power, JSW Energy, and Grew Energy won. In the CM category, they were Kolkata-based Vikram Solar, Amp Energy India, and Tata Power Solar. The manufacturing facility capacity allocated under the current tranche is 39.6 Gw with an allocation of Rs 13,937 crore. In a public statement, R K Singh, Union minister for power, new and renewable energy, said: “The PLI scheme has proved to be a watershed in India’s renewable landscape, resulting in around 48 GW domestic module manufacturing capacity in three years. The scheme has boosted the government’s efforts to reduce not only the impact of the global supply chain shocks but also our import dependence adhering to the Hon’ble Prime Minister’s vision of an Aatmanirbhar Bharat.”

There were 11 bidders in the second phase. A major absence was Adani Enterprises, which was a winner in the first phase for 4 Gw of solar module manufacturing. In the first tranche, the Centre received 18 bids, for close to 50 Gw, against a PLI sanction of Rs 4,500 crore and requests for proposal of 10 Gw. The bids were from a range of companies such as Coal India, L&T, Vikram Solar, Megha Engineering, and several new firms. The corpus was increased to Rs 19,500 crore in the Union Budget 2022-23 to accommodate the large number of bids. The nodal agency for the second tranche is Solar Energy Corporation of India. It was the Indian Renewable Energy Development Agency earlier.