India added 29.52 gigawatt (GW) of renewable energy in the financial year 2024-25, a record annual capacity addition, taking the country’s total installed renewable energy capacity to 220.10 GW as of March 31. In FY24, the country’s installed RE capacity stood at 198.75 GW.
Among the renewable energy sources, solar energy contributed the highest to the year’s capacity expansion with 23.83 GW added in the last fiscal, a significant increase over the 15.03 GW added in the previous year, as per official data. The total installed solar capacity now stands at 105.65 GW, including 81.01 GW from ground-mounted installations, 17.02 GW from rooftop solar, 2.87 GW from solar components of hybrid projects, and 4.74 GW from off-grid systems.
In addition with the new capacities, the country also increased its manufacturing capacity of solar modules and cells in the calendar year 2024, reducing its dependence on imports. As per data from Mercom, India added 25.3 GW of solar module capacity and 11.6 GW of solar cell capacity, primarily driven by demand from the solar project pipeline and reimposition of the Approved List of Models and Manufacturers.
The country also added 4.15 GW of new wind capacity compared with 3.25 GW in FY24. The total cumulative installed wind capacity now stands at 50.04 GW.
As per the government data, bioenergy installations reached a total capacity of 11.58 GW, which includes 0.53 GW from off-grid and waste-to-energy projects. Small hydro power projects have achieved a capacity of 5.10 GW, with a further 0.44 GW under implementation. “These sectors continue to complement the solar and wind segments by contributing to the decentralised and diversified nature of India’s energy landscape,” the government said.
In addition to the installed capacities, the country also has 169.40 GW of renewable energy projects under implementation and 65.06 GW already tendered. This includes 65.29 GW from emerging solutions such as hybrid systems, round-the-clock (RTC) power, peaking power, and thermal plus RE bundling projects.
The country has envisaged to add 500 GW of renewable energy capacity by the year 2030. In addition with the new capacities, the government is also targeting to build adequate infrastructure including energy storage systems and transmission lines for the installed renewable energy capacity to be operationable.
In the current fiscal 2025-26, the Central Electricity Authority has planned to concur a minimum of 13 pumped storage projects of about capacity of 22 GW. Most of these PSPs are targeted to be commissioned in the next four years and latest by 2030.
“Development of these projects shall boost energy storage capacity drastically in the country, making a major contribution to grid reliability and supporting India’s ambitious renewable energy goals,” the government said.