India becoming big player on global solar energy map

India is rapidly becoming force to reckon with in global solar energy development. The government has already laid out a rather ambitious plan for solar energy development with a target of 100 GW of installed solar power capacity by 2022.

Optimism could soon turn to realism because India is taking big steps in that direction. It is expected that India will pass the 15 GW mark by the March 2017 while the current capacity is somewhere at 8-9 GW.

Not only that, India is expected to increase its module and cells manufacturing capacity to 10 and 2 GW respectively, in the next couple of years.

There are still some issues that need to be solved in order for solar to have clear path towards the bright future.  The most obvious issues include inadequate government funding and cheap imports (mostly from China).

Solar energy industry needs to be cost-competitive with other energy industries in order to thrive and become one of the most important industries in the country.

In this sense, the Goods and Services Tax (GST) which is likely to be over 18% could significantly hinder further growth of solar energy development in India. There have been calls from developers to exempt solar from GST but whether solar will get this privilege still remains to be seen.