With increasing fluctuation in electricity prices and unpredictable power availability from conventional sources, rooftop solar adoption is starting to grow.

This comes at a time when consumers across all major categories, including commercial, industrial, residential and public sector, are now adopting solar energy, which theoretically has the potential to save costs and provide a reliable and sustainable solution to meet their energy requirements.

Praveer Sinha, CEO & MD, Tata Power, said, “Solar rooftops not only offer an economical and clean alternative to conventional energy sources but also deliver reliability. With the increased adoption of rooftop solar by consumers, we are confident that our solar rooftop solutions will play a big role in improving energy access across the country, in both urban and rural parts.”

The push for solar adoption is on the rise, particularly the usage of rooftop solar. A few days ago, Tamil Nadu Electricity Minister P Thangamani announced that more than ₹750 crore worth projects that include rooftop solar units, implementation of prepaid meters and other customer-friendly initiatives will be undertaken in 2020-21. This includes setting up 50-MW rooftop solar projects with an outlay of ₹250 crore in 2020-21, he told the State Assembly. Seeing an opportunity, Tata Power has expanded its rooftop solar offerings to 90 cities.

Vikram Solar has executed projects which include a 270 kW project for Voith Hydro Pvt Ltd in Vadodara, a 220 kW project at Gondia airport for AAI, among others.

Bhilosa Industries, a polyester yarn manufacturer, which uses rooftop solar power, said the company has installed almost 3 MW of rooftop solar at its plant in Silvassa. “In less than a year of adoption, with savings in excess of 4.5 million power units so far, we are now expanding it by another 3 MW,” said Apoorva Jhaveri, from Bhilosa Industries.

For businesses or residences, installing rooftop solar helps in getting a better picture of the cost of electricity generation for future years. Hospitals like Cardinal Gracias to establishments like WeWork in Mumbai are using rooftop solar.

Rajkot-based Balaji Wafers, a homegrown food products company, pointed out to savings of 7 lakh units of power and around ₹50 lakh with the usage of renewables and is now expanding its investment in rooftop solar at its factories in Valsad and Indore. “We will continue to invest in this,” said Jai Sachdev, Head – Marketing at Balaji Wafers. Others like Abid Siddiqui, Plant Head, Bisleri International, said apart from clean energy, low maintenance accentuates the importance of rooftop solar panels.

However, India installed 7,346 megawatts (MW) of solar in the calendar year 2019, a 12 per cent decline on a yearly basis, according to research by Mercom.

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