Solar power has had a slow start, but with increasing corporate interest, it might just make the 1,100 MW target by 2012
For all the hoopla around solar energy, less than 2 MW of power gets produced in India by harnessing the sun. The first phase target of the Jawaharlal Nehru National Solar Mission (part of the National Action Plan on climate change flagged off by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh a year ago) is to commission 1,100 MW of solar power by 2012, gathering speed to reach 20,000 MW by 2020. This is a figure that sounds utopian to even the greenest energy evangelist. Most installed projects currently operate at below 20 percent of their capacity and funding by banks and financial institutions is slow.
(This story appears in the 03 December, 2010 issue of Forbes India. To visit our Archives, click here.)