Need policies to deploy more solar panels: Waaree group Chairman & MD

The world's largest solar panel maker outside China spoke about the challenges and opportunities facing the industry

India’s solar module making capacity is set to surge in a few years and with annual solar installations averaging 14-15 Gw, can Indian manufacturers sustain operations owing to low demand and slow pace of installations in the country? Hitesh Chimanlal Doshi, chairman and managing director of Waaree group, the world’s largest solar panel maker outside China — who recently inaugurated a 1.3 Gw solar modules plant in Noida — spoke to S Dinakar in a video interview about the challenges and opportunities for the industry. Edited excerpts:

In the first six months of this year, newly-installed solar power capacity in China reached nearly 100 Gw while India added only 3.7 Gw in the April-June quarter, a steep fall from 10 Gw in the previous quarter. Why is India unable to speed up installations?
 

Besides India, whatever the entire world was putting into solar, China was installing equally. Coming to the India story, we have seen that year-on-year (Y-o-Y) there is a lot of work left towards infrastructure. The government has understood that the top priority is grid connection and making land available for large projects. This will create demand. At the same time, the government understood that if it can create more rooftops, it will help. Thus, we have seen that more than 30 Gw of rooftop schemes have been announced. And, the speed is 

picking up now.
 

So, what are the key issues that have prevented India from catching up with China? What is China doing that India should do?

China invested a lot in infrastructure, much before us, particularly on grid connection. And number two, it has huge land parcels. We almost have the same population but the size of China and the land it has is much larger. So, for deployment, what we need are policies and support to deploy more solar panels. Apart from that, we need land and grid availability. If that is in place, putting a solar power plant is not a challenge.
 

What is the status of India’s current solar module manufacturing capacity?
 

We have seen that India has crossed 50 Gw production capacity in modules. It is going to be 60 Gw in less than a quarter. So, supply side, there is no challenge if the land and grid connections are there. Execution is not a challenge, only infrastructure is.

 A few developers said the approved list of modules and manufacturers (ALMM) was an obstacle to speeding up installations and increased cost--import taxes were sufficient. What is your take on this?
 

The fact is that even if there was a duty, we were importing solar panels. So, it was very clear that when the duty was there, we were importing more than 90 per cent of our country’s requirements. With China, this war is not directly played. There are proxy countries like Vietnam, Thailand and many more with whom we have free-trade agreements. So, if you look back again to the numbers in the last two years, from zero imports to thousands of megawatts, imports have started from Vietnam to save duties.

Coming back to ALMM — is it true that Indian module makers export their panels for better margins rather than sell domestically. Waaree is a big exporter of panels to the US.
 

There is a lot of noise in the market without knowing the facts. Total exports last year were around 5 Gw. Total demand in the country last financial year, according to the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) website, was 15 Gw. The inspected, tested, model manufacturing capacity in India is over 50 Gw (under ALMM). Now, if you put these three numbers together, the supply is more than 2x of export and the Indian demand.
 

So, manufacturers are not running their capacities in full, given the low installation rate in the first quarter of this financial year.
 

Last year was the worst for the Indian module manufacturers. Of course, Waaree has done well. Besides Waaree, when we speak about the industry, last year, Indian module manufacturers’ capacity utilisation was much below 25 per cent. Waaree was in a better position with a huge number of confirmed orders. So, we will continue to utilise it better later. But overall, as a country, we have to see how fast we are going to increase the demand of local manufacturers.

So, how do you think going forward it will affect your utilisation and what should the government do about it?

Of course, we need a larger market. But at Waaree, we definitely have a large order book. The company is doing well and will continue to do well. As an industry and market, when we speak about it, we definitely need to have a larger market, more focus on Made in India, and try to stop whatever imports are happening at present. Waaree has declared many orders received from Indian developers in the last couple of months. So, we will see the installation pick up very fast after the monsoon.

What about the technology? Are Indian manufacturers offering older technology for the panels?

This is again a myth. Most of the capacity in the country has come up in the last two years. So, the machines in the country we have today are able to produce not only the technology available today, but also what we are expecting in the next two years. This is a capital investment, and anyone who makes the investment will think of tomorrow, whether my machine will work tomorrow or not. We have been manufacturing XJT and Topcon for a long time. And the orders we have declared are with the largest size of the wafer available in the market today.