May 27, 2021
India is targeting about 450 Gigawatt (GW) of installed renewable energy capacity by 2030 and, of that, a lion’s share – 280 GW (over 60%)–would come from solar. For the next 10 years, around 25 GW of solar energy capacity is needed to be installed every year, to ensure the sun continues to shine over the country’s sunrise sector.
The target also means India needs to manoeuvre global supply chain issues, irrespective of geopolitical realities and mining concerns, impacting the producers of major minerals required in the solar industry.
The Indian solar industry relies heavily on imports of important components such as solar cells, modules and solar inverters. Every year, the industry ends up spending billions on imports. According to the Indian government’s data, in 2019-20, India imported solar wafers, cells, modules and inverters worth $ 2.5 billion.
In charts: India needs a robust solar power policy to meet its renewable energy targets by 2030
Since the country doesn’t manufacture enough solar modules domestically, it will have to spend billions of dollars over the years to import them. Representational image. | Sam Panthaky/ AFP
India is targeting about 450 gigawatts of installed renewable energy capacity by 2030 and, of that, a lion’s share – 280 GW (over 60%) – would come from solar. For the next 10 years, around 25 GW of solar energy capacity is needed to be installed every year, to ensure the sun continues to shine over the country’s sunrise sector.
The target also means India needs to manoeuvre global supply chain issues, irrespective of geopolitical realities and mining concerns, impacting the producers of major minerals required in the solar industry.
Synopsis
The recycling initiative is already underway at the Charlotte, North Carolina-based company, with a joint development agreement in place with a customer and the company looking at making investments with original equipment manufacturers.
iStock
Recycling is viewed by environmental groups as one important way to reduce new mining projects.
The world’s biggest lithium miner wants to extract more of the battery metal from old cars as demand surges and aging electric vehicles are traded in.
Albemarle Corp. is making investments and partnering with automotive equipment manufacturers on the recycling effort, which it calls “critical” to its future growth.