By Somit Dasgupta

During the deliberations at the Conference of the Parties (COP 26) in Glasgow (2021), the Indian government had announced the “Panchamrit” where one of the targets was to have at least 50% of the generation capacity consisting of non-fossil sources by 2030. We have already achieved this target five years ahead of schedule as we have a non-fossil capacity of 242.8 gigawatts (Gw) out of a total capacity of 484.8 Gw. Seeing this, one wonders if the target was too soft to begin with. At the time of the Panchamrit announcement, we already had a non-fossil generating capacity of about 163 Gw which was almost 41% of the total capacity. So reaching a 50% share of non-fossil capacity was not that difficult, especially since our pace of coal-based plants has slowed down. The other issue is whether capacity is the right measure or should the target have been set in terms of generation from non-fossil sources. After all, renewable capacity does lie idle frequently on account of many factors. Incidentally, there is a tendency to use share in capacity and generation interchangeably, including in government documents, but this is erroneous since capacity utilisation for renewable sources like solar and wind is much lower than that of conventional generation, meaning coal. So today, while the share in capacity of solar and wind is about 35%, their share in generation is only 12.5%.

Coming back to the central theme of the piece, what should be the major policy measure beyond 2030? The government, in a way, has tacitly........

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