India may soften new grid-supply rules for renewable power producers

NEW DELHI: India may ease proposed penalties on wind and solar power producers who fail to meet stricter grid-supply commitments, government minutes showed, after developers warned the changes could hurt revenue and slow clean-energy investment.

The power regulator - the Central Electricity Regulatory Commission - proposed tighter rules for wind and solar power producers in a draft published in September.

The regulations aimed to gradually narrow the gap between the amount of electricity producers commit to supply and what they actually generate.

The new rules, which included hefty penalties for missing grid-supply commitments, were supposed to come into effect from April 2026.

In a meeting with the country’s power and clean energy ministers in late January, India’s clean energy developers warned that the stricter rules could lead to significant revenue losses, the minutes showed.

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Earlier, many industry stakeholders had written to the regulator, saying that the proposed plan would slow investment in clean energy.

The government asked the power regulator to examine the request of power producers.

The penalties may be “re-examined” by the electricity regulator, according to the minutes seen by Reuters.

In November, Reuters reported that India’s clean energy ministry had urged the power regulator to delay plans for stricter rules.

The Central Electricity Authority, which advises the federal power ministry, told the ministers during the January meeting that the implementation of stricter rules had already been deferred by two years to give the industry more time to improve forecasting accuracy, the minutes showed.

But the developers argued the new rules would still hurt operational projects commissioned under older, easier norms, according to the minutes.

India aims to nearly double its non-fossil-based power capacity by 2030 to 500 gigawatts.