ACME Solar Signs 300-MW Solar-Storage Peak Power PPA With SECI
- ACME Solar signed a 300-MW, 1,200-MWh peak supply contract with SECI at INR 6 ($0.063) per kWh.
- The tariff is almost double the INR 3.05 per kWh ACME won for a 300-MW SECI solar project in December 2024.
- ACME must deliver four hours of power a day outside solar hours at 90% monthly availability.
ACME Solar Holdings Ltd. signed a 300-megawatt power purchase agreement with Solar Energy Corp. of India to deliver 1,200 megawatt-hours of electricity a day outside solar hours, at a fixed INR 6 ($0.063) per kilowatt-hour.
The contract, signed through subsidiary ACME Greentech Twenty and effective Oct. 6, comes from the ninth round of SECI's firm and dispatchable renewable energy (FDRE) tenders, which opened in June. ACME will combine solar generation with co-located battery storage. It must supply 4 MWh for each contracted megawatt during any four non-solar hours a day and keep monthly availability at 90%, according to a statement ACME filed with Indian stock exchanges on Oct. 19.
That price is almost twice what ACME gets for daytime solar. In December 2024 it won a 300-MW SECI solar project at INR 3.05 per kWh. The gap pays for the batteries that hold midday output until the evening peak.
The deal in numbers
- 300 MW / 1,200 MWh of daily peak supply contracted with SECI.
- 4 hours a day, at any time outside solar hours, with at least 90% availability each month.
- INR 6 ($0.063) per kWh, up 97% from the INR 3.05 ACME won for a SECI solar project in December 2024.
- About 438 GWh a year at full delivery, worth roughly INR 2.6 billion ($28 million) annually at the contract tariff (list.solar calculation).
- 2nd FDRE contract with SECI in 2026. The first, also 300 MW / 1,200 MWh, was signed in May.
- INR 1,571 crore (about $165 million) of project debt raised from India Infrastructure Finance Co. in August for the May project.
- 4.96 GWh of battery storage and 3,123 MW of generation already in operation at ACME, according to the company.
ACME keeps adding batteries in Rajasthan. On Oct. 1, it said another 107.36 MW / 437.49 MWh of storage had begun operating there. Its contracted portfolio across solar, wind, storage and hybrid projects now stands at 8,370 MW, and 4,310 MW of the 5,380 MW under construction have signed PPAs, ACME said.
The deal will help "support the growing need for reliable, dispatchable clean power during evening and night-time peak demand," ACME said.
India is expanding its grid to absorb more of these projects. On Sept. 30, the federal Cabinet approved the third phase of the Green Energy Corridor transmission program, worth INR 1.86 trillion (about $19.6 billion), including INR 500 billion for 50 GWh of battery storage.