Assam Power Distribution Company Ltd (APDCL) has set a target of 250MW capacity of grid-connected solar rooftop plants in the state of Assam within the next 5 years. In an aim to make a stronger push in the direction of achieving that APDCL has appointed RECPDCL as the Project Management Consultant for implementing rooftop solar projects of 10MW capacity. As with every initiative to push solar, the aim here is to reduce the dependency on the fossil-based electricity and make the state as self-reliant as possible. Extra power produced by the plants set up under the scheme will be fed back to the grid.

On behalf of APDCL, RECPDC has invited bids in two categories from the interested solar companies. These bids are for the Category A and Category B, where Category A houses individual projects between 1 to 25 kWp and Category B has projects between 25 and 500 kWp. Both the categories has been tentatively assigned a capacity of 5MWp. It has been made mandatory that anyone who wishes to participate in the bidding has to bid for the category A and subsequently may decide to bid in category B. The tender will not cover government buildings, so the likes of Central or State Government offices, PSUs, Government Educational Institutes or Health institutes cannot be used for installing the panels. The eligible categories are: Residential, Institutional and Social Sector. The building details are below:

The projects will be based on CAPEX models and the bidders have until February 15th to send their bids in. It has been mandated that the project must be completed in 15 months post the date of the award. A single bidder can at best be awarded 40% of capacity in any of the two categories. Net metering and grid connectivity will be in accordance to the current regulatory commission guidelines. Project developers are not just expected to identify buildings and obtaining the requisite permissions, designing the system and commissioning it but also mandatorily have to supply services for maintenance of the plant for five years. A 70% Central Finance Assistance on the project cost is available for the developers except for the private, commercial and industrial sectors.

The tender joins the 1000MW tender floated by SECI as yet another strong example of the efforts that the various government agencies are making in order to make solar rooftop a household name. With APDCL making it compulsory for every bidder to participate in the Category A, it mandatorily pushes the propagation of smaller scale rooftop plants especially for the residential sector. We feel that it is a great initiative to ensure that small scale distributed solar is given a push to involve and bring on board smaller residential players. If you are reading this in Assam and would like to make the most of this opportunity, make sure that you Register your Rooftop with MYSUN so that when the developers are looking for the rooftops for the project, you are able to make the most of the opportunity.

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Image source: Energy Next

If you spent the recent onset of winters in Delhi, you would know the terror of air pollution that the city is fighting against. This is not something conditional to the winters of 2017 as Delhi has been at loggerheads with air pollution for a couple of years now. There was the infamous odd-even move and despite that the particulate levels in the air remain higher than what should be ideal. This pollution has been attributed primarily to the large industries, crops being burnt and increasing vehicles on the road. Needless to say that we need to find a solution. One such solution could be solar bicycles going mainstream.

To fight the problem and threat of air pollution, scientists are looking to build solar assisted bicycles which would help fight not just the pollution but also lighten the traffic on the road. According to a report in The Economic Times, Mr SA Puviyarasu from the Dr N G P Institute of Technology, Anna University has confirmed efforts are being made to develop an eco-friendly solar bicycle to help combat the problem of air pollution. The solar assisted bicycle according to him, has the potential to reduce up to 60% of all the vehicle pollution in India. It may look like an ambitious number, especially considering that bicycles have never been a popular mode of transport in India at least in the metro cities.

The solar bicycle has solar panels that are mounted on the cycle carrier. These panels generate the electricity based on the specification of the panels used and the energy is further stored in a Lead Acid battery. The battery then drives a brushless DC motor mounted on the front wheel allowing the rider to change the speed of the bicycle. You may be wondering that this makes the cycle a fancy e-cycle more than a cycle but the rider can choose to use the motor or not or simply go ahead and pedal his way to the destination. The motor and pedal can both be used simultaneously as well.

Mr Puviyarasu has been quoted as saying the bike can be modified and customized depending upon the need of the user. It is estimated that these bikes will be on the road, sometime next year around 2018. When released, the bike is slated to cost anywhere in between Rs 12,000 to Rs 15,000.

image source: LauraW-B

Rooftop solar has been assigned a contribution of 40GW out of the total 100GW of installed capacity under the Solar Mission of 2022. While that number may seem daunting right now, we are already seeing efforts being made both by the central government as well as several state governments in this direction. The 500MW and 1000MW SECI tenders are good examples of how the central government has been taking initiatives in order to push the adoption of rooftop solar in 2017. On the other hand, the initiatives taken by CREST for example in Chandigarh or the recent Re 1/unit incentive that Haryana (HAREDA) announced for rooftop solar plants are steps in the right direction.

Adding to the list of initiates is the announcement of Karnataka Renewable Energy Development Ltd or KREDL that it plans to install 6,000MW by March 2021, revising the old target of 2300MW grid connected Solar Rooftop PV Systems by 2022 in Karnataka. It was reported as far back as  May 2016 that Karnataka was planning to modify its solar policy to achieve the 6000 MW figure. Finally, the change was approved on Tuesday (January 10th, 2017) to help tap the massive 24,700MW solar potential of the state. The current installed capacity stands at 400MW.

Overall, the amendments are in tune with the tariff policy announced by MNRE. It has been mandated by KREDL that 40% of the total solar generation must come from rooftops, giving a huge push to the rooftop segment. Solar Energy, in total should constitute 8% of the overall energy consumption. It has been introduced that the generation would be limited to 200MW per taluk from all sources excluding the generation from rooftop projects. This would encourage a more distributed approach in the power generation capacity in the state, where currently the solar projects are more concentrated in and around Bengaluru. The capacity of solar parks has been limited to 100MW at a single location. The state has also announced establishing a solar energy center for excellence in order to promote innovation in R&D in the space.

MYSUN believes that this is a very positive step taken by the Karnataka government. The consumer tariffs in Karnataka are already on the higher side. Consumers pay anywhere between Rs 6.9/kWh to Rs 8.35/kWh, and these tariffs increase every year. Whereas with rooftop solar, consumers can lock in a fixed levelised tariff of less than Rs 6/kWh for the next 25 years. As per our research, switching to rooftop and distributed solar, all these consumers not just stand to make huge savings on their electricity bills but they also get a very high Return on Investment (ROI). And the incentives announced by the state government will further help in encouraging consumers to go solar. However, it is equally important that KREDL develops an equally effective implementation roadmap so that these incentives don’t just remain on paper.

You can expect the updated policy to be available online at the KREDL website here.

Source of Image: Indian Solar market

After a long wait, SECI has finally released the state-wise list of successful bidders. In the pursuit to simplify solar for the end users, at MYSUN, we have further analyzed this list to develop a much-simplified version, available on request, with a state-wise list of solar installers/developers along with the applicable subsidy and subsidized tariffs for these states. The expert solar advisor team at MYSUN is committed to helping all our clients to get the most competitive solar system from the most suitable solar installer/ developer and help them benchmark each of these installers to get the most out of your solar systems. Our clients can also run our Solar Calculator specially modified to showcase the SECI Subsidy and find out for themselves how much they stand to gain with the help of these subsidies. You can simply Register your Rooftop at our online platform. And our tech team will do a preliminary technical assessment and will then get in touch with these qualified solar installers/ developers and get the most competitive quotes with subsidies for your rooftops.

The 500 MW grid connected solar PV rooftop tender by SECI has generated a lot of interest among the residential, institutional and social customers. As we have experienced on MYSUN, the 30% minimum subsidy that has been offered by the central government is proving to be quite an attractive prospect propelling those eligible, to go solar. While rooftop solar started making financial sense, purely from a returns point of view for virtually everyone who is paying more than Rs 1500 as their electricity bill as you can read here, the subsidy just makes the pie taste even sweeter.

You can read the highlights of the SECI subsidy and how you can avail the Central Finance Assistance if you want to install a rooftop solar in a post we have compiled here. In case you are wondering whether you are eligible for this SECI subsidy, you can go through our specially designed solar tool to help you determine your eligibility as well as our MYSUN SECI Solar Calculator specially designed to give you an overview of your system size, cost, savings, and returns when you avail the SECI subsidy as stated above.

It is worth noting that the subsidy will be arranged for you by the developer and there is no effort that you will have to make on it. SECI has published the list of qualified developers, who have won bids in the SECI tender. You can view the list here and these selected developers will be able to get you the subsidy here. A high majority of the developers here are already partners with MYSUN so when you Register your Rooftop, or if you have already Registered your Rooftop with us, the leads will be shared with these developers to help you get the system with the subsidy. So if you want to make the most of this opportunity and get a solar subsidy via this SECI program, go ahead and Register on MYSUN in case you have not. In case you are just curious to know your solarization potential where no subsidy is taken into account, you can always check out our Solar Calculator here.

If you have been actively following the MYSUN blog, you would have come across Part 1 of our blog series on common myths around solar energy, specifically rooftop solar. The aim of doing these series of posts is to try and reason out and explain some of the common notions that people have in context of solar energy or solar system, or perhaps solar in general are incorrect. This is not to establish, that everything you know about or read about solar is inaccurate or incomplete but simply that everything that you hear may not be the most accurate version.

We captured five common myths and explained them in the first part of this article, and this new piece shall try and cater to five more such common misconceptions. For a more accurate take, you can always head over to our Solar Essentials page that has all the information you need before deciding to go solar. As Alan Watts puts it aptly, ‘A myth is an image in terms of which we try to make sense of the world’. So before you go about building your solar world based on perceptions, let’s address them logically one by one.

Myth 1) Solar panels will damage my roof:

We all love our houses and properties, in fact a lot of effort and financial resources have gone into building it. It would be foolishness to install something on top of it, which could lead to its damage or a collapse. Fortunately, installing a solar panel on the rooftop is not equivalent to landing a heavy chopper on your rooftop. There are various well-proven globally accepted norms for installing solar panels on rooftops without any damage to the roofs. Using mounting rails or even screwing(small puncture) methods have been used quite predominantly.But you should be careful while selecting your solar installer. Read more about different types of roofs and how solar panels can be safely mounted on them here. Most buildings built over the last 20-25 years can be assumed to be safe for installing solar panels. Moreover, if you need some unrelated repair work on the roofs in future, you can get the panels removed, do your repair work and re-install the solar panels. Panels are removable and hence can be easily removed if the roof is to be repaired. On the contrary, solar panels actually protect the roof which they cover from the forces of nature. Add to the fact there are no moving parts and no emission of harmful gasses, solar panels are perfectly safe for your roof.

Myth 2) Solar panels need a tracking system to follow the sun:

It is true that higher the exposure to the sun, higher would be yield from a solar system. However, a solar PV system can work perfectly efficiently without involving a tracking system. Observations show that a tracking system may increase the solar system efficiency by 15~20 % as compared to a fixed or seasonal tilt systems. However, this increment may not justify the additional expense for everyone. It is like adding spoilers to your car. No doubt that it will enhance the efficiency and get you better performance, but it is up to you to justify the additional cost for the benefit. Also, the tracking system needs higher maintenance and replacement cost due to the involvement of an increased number of moving parts.

Myth 3) Installing a solar panel/ system on my rooftop will make my house look ugly:

If you have spent plenty of hours with an architect getting the roof of your mansion, just perfect, it is justified that you are worried about looks. We agree that the thought of beauty being skin deep is not true for houses. However, with today’s technology and the right solar system design and choice of material and workmanship, the solar panels can be installed in a manner so as to ensure that they look great on your roof. Add to that the additional pride that you have of going ‘green’ which can definitely make your neighbors go ‘green’ with envy. Moreover, if you want to keep the look of the building pristine, you may want to consider thin film laminate based solar panels. These will make the panels look as though they are a part of the rooftop only rather than something constructed as an afterthought. Yes, these thin film laminates are more expensive than the usual choice of panels, but they would eventually add value to the property and not to forget, installing them would mean that they pay back the investment within their lifetime alone. There is obviously the option of a shingles like setup that Tesla has come up, more on which can be found here. So, if you are too conscious about the looks, there is a solution for that too, albeit a little expensive one.

Myth 4) When nobody has power at their house, I will have power:

As much as we would love for that fact that you have electricity 24x7 at your place, this myth is well, a myth. With a solar system installed, the only difference between the power that you and your neighbor, who does not have solar installed, is the source of generation. However, if there is a fault in the transmission line or the entire grid is down, and you are using a grid-tied solar system, you too will be forced to have a candle light dinner, with no power. If there is a maintenance work for example being held on the grid, you will not be left untouched by the same and sadly will have to fall back on the generator system to provide you with power till the grid is restored. However, if you are not connected to the grid or using a battery-backed solar system and the power is being supplied and consumed just by your house, you will have the power when the grid fails.

Myth 5) Chinese Solar Panels are bad and if you have them, they will fail:

This is a myth that extends from a reputation that has been built. We have heard the same story repeated in the world of electronics, especially phones, where Chinese phones are labeled as cheap devices, with a short lifespan. However, just like in electronics, even in solar, there are Chinese brands that are doing very well. For example, Growatt, a Chinese inverter manufacturing company has the highest market share in Australia when it comes to solar. Similarly, there are names like Trina and Yingli, which are very well trusted, globally. Just like any industry, there are good players and there are bad players, and that is why choosing a right supplier for the system is important, so that he will pay your faith back and not install a sub-standard system. We have spoken a bit more about the myth of Chinese solar products in our post here.

It is imperative to say here that you need to be diligent while selecting your solar system installer. Once that is done, please be rest assured that your investment in solar will be amongst your best investments ever. We at MYSUN are there to not only help you find the right solar installer but also be there on your side during the system design, construction and for the 25 years long life of your solar system.

With that, we round up our second post on the myths that surround solar. We hope, we are able to bring more and more clarity to you from the world of solar as the series is progressing. Do share your feedbacks, thoughts and comments with us, by mentioning them in the section below or catching us up on our social media profiles.