Existing grid connected Solar PV Plants in India

MNRE has recently released the list of all grid operating solar PV projects in India (latest updated as on July 2011. See the detailed list here and also below).

 The Project Developers for these cumulative 45.5MW capacity plants were:

1. Sri Power Generation (India) Pvt. Ltd. 
2. Reliance Industries Ltd.
3. North Delhi Power Ltd.
4. Lanco Infratech Limited
5. Sun Edison
6. Azure Power Private Ltd.
7. C & S Electric Limited
8. Karnataka Power Corporation Limited
9. Karnataka Power Corporation Limited
10. Maharashtra State Power Generation Co. Ltd.
11. Tata Power Company
12. Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar Sahkari Sakhar Karkhana Ltd.
13. Raajratna Energy Holdings Private Limited
14. Azure Power Private Limited
15. Reliance Industries Limited, Solar Group
16. ACME Tele Power Ltd.
17. Sapphire Industrial Infrastructures Private Limited
18. B & G Solar Private Limited
19. R L Clean power Pvt. Ltd.
20. West Bengal Green Energy Development Corporation Limited

With increasing Solar EPC and manufacturing experience building in Indian players, MNRE has also published a performance report on 6 grid connected power plants in India. The report parameterize some performance parameters like:

• Technology
• Actual Generation (in kWhs) - total, month wise
• % Capacity Utilization Factor- CUF (Average over period of operation, Maximum, Minimum)

Some key observations made:

• Avg CUF or Plant Load Factor (PLF) across the year is in range of 15-19%
• Peak CUF occurs in March to May and range from 20.21% to 23.63%
• Grid synchronization takes 2-4 months initial settling period with CUF going down to less than 10%

The report is first good step in monitoring performance and stakeholder engagement. However a big leap in monitoring solar plants performance and integrating the analytics to design appropriate solutions has to still happen. 

Post by Rahul Bagdia @ pManifold