India's DVC to create virtually 1.8 GW of floating solar-- report

• Indian state-owned power firm Damodar Valley Corporation (DVC) will certainly concentrate entirely on solar projects to include extra capability, as it seeks to establish a considerable floating PV portfolio.

That is according to a Press Trust of India (PTI) report, which says the firm has suggested 1,776 MW of floating solar projects in four of its dams in the states of West Bengal and Jharkhand.

DVC participant assistant Prabir Kumar Mukhopadhyay informed the news agency that the firm plans to carry out the projects in three phases, the very first of which will certainly have a capacity of 50MW.

The relocation stands for a substantial solar buildout for DVC, which is primarily focused on coal-fired generation as well as hydropower, with a set up capability of more than 7.2 GW. Mukhopadhyay claimed the corporation has, nonetheless, retired old thermal centers with a complete capacity of 840MW in the last two years.

The possibility of India's floating PV market was described in a recent report from brain trust The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI), which located that the nation's storage tanks could be used to produce 280GW of solar energy, with the states of Maharashtra, Karnataka as well as Madhya Pradesh showing considerable promise. The research study computed the possibility for floating solar on the basis of 30% of the water surface area of the nation's tool as well as large tanks.

TERI says that while ground-based installations currently stand for around 93% of India's grid-connected solar PV field, the country needs to explore and also establish floating solar to meet nationwide targets for renewable energy enhancements. It is approximated that the global annual ability additions from floating solar in the nation might climb from the 1.3 GWp in 2018 to 4.6 GWp by 2022.

"Floating solar PV could be a potential alternative for speeding up solar power implementation in the nation, which would inevitably help in attaining NDC (nationally identified contributions) goals. It is time to look for bringing a favorable policy framework to motivate tapping this capacity," Ajay Mathur, supervisor general at TERI, stated.

The technology is also being harnessed by NTPC, India's largest power business, which has around 250MW of floating solar projects unfinished. The bulk state-owned utility is aiming to establish more than 5GW of brand-new solar capacity over the following 2 years as part of efforts to minimize its carbon impact. The firm revealed recently it will not to acquire any kind of more land for greenfield thermal projects "in the future".