New Delhi: Union Minister for New and Renewable Energy Pralhad Joshi will meet Power Minister Manohar Lal on May 13 to address a set of pressing challenges facing clean energy producers, including the curtailment of Renewable Energy (RE) output at the grid level and gaps in transmission infrastructure needed to evacuate solar and wind power.
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Joshi made the statement on the sidelines of the CII Annual Business Summit, saying various issues around boosting renewable energy would come up for discussion, including the deviation settlement mechanism (DSM), curtailment and transmission network capacity.
Renewable energy producers are routinely asked to back down their output when supply exceeds demand on the grid. Because coal-based thermal plants cannot be economically ramped below 50 percent of their plant load factor, or capacity utilisation, it is solar and wind generation that gets curtailed when there is surplus power on the network — leaving green energy producers bearing the cost of weather-driven variability they cannot control.
The DSM compounds the problem. Under this mechanism, power producers face financial penalties for deviating from their committed electricity supply schedules. Renewable energy companies argue this framework is ill-suited to their operations, since their generation is inherently dependent on weather conditions and cannot be precisely forecast or controlled.
A lack of transmission infrastructure for evacuating electricity from renewable energy projects remains a parallel concern, according to industry. As solar and wind capacity continues to be commissioned at scale, the absence of adequate grid connectivity is preventing producers from delivering power to consumers even when generation is available.
Joshi also flagged delays in the signing of Power Purchase Agreements (PPAs) for green energy projects, saying he would shortly meet all affected developers to address the backlog. He added that the government would soon announce a policy on polysilicon, a critical raw material used in the manufacture of solar photovoltaic cells and semiconductors — a move that could have significant implications for India's domestic solar manufacturing ecosystem.
Industry voices at the Summit called for ambition beyond the government's existing 500 GW renewable energy target for 2030. Rahul Munjal, Co-Chairman of the CII National Committee on Renewable Energy and Founder and Chairman of Hero Future Energies, said energy self-reliance must be treated as a national priority, and that India should set its sights on a long-term clean energy vision including a one-terawatt capacity goal.
Girish Tanti, Chairman of the CII RE Manufacturing Council and Vice-Chairman of Suzlon, said India is uniquely placed as a leader combining scale, speed, resilience and self-reliance in the sector, while stressing the need to strengthen grid infrastructure, bidding processes and domestic manufacturing ecosystems to sustain momentum toward the 500 GW target.
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Suchitra Ella, Vice President of CII, noted that India added 55.3 GW of non-fossil fuel capacity in FY 2025-26 and met over 51 percent of peak electricity demand through renewables — reflecting, she said, strong policy direction, execution capability and industry participation.
