APPLICABLE POLICIES

Karnataka Solar Policy and it's Solar Highlights

Karnataka is a state located in the southern-western part of India. The capital city of Karnataka is Bengaluru, which is considered to be the Silicon Valley of India. It is the seventh largest state in the country and one of the high contributors of commissioned solar power. IN fact, according to several reports the state has the largest capacity of almost 3.2GW of the upcoming solar projects in India, leaving states like Andhra Pradesh and Telangana behind. As of January 2017, Karnataka had a total of 341.93MW of commissioned solar power, out of which, 196.46MW came in in the previous financial year 2016/17. Karnataka has a very strong focus towards solar and in 2016 revised its target to achieve 6000MW of grid connected solar power by the year 2021. The state solar energy potentials is more than 24,700MW and therefore it will play a key role if India has to reach the target of 100GW by the year 2022. Further, to encourage rooftop solar the latest policy change mandates that at least 40% of this 6000MW must come from rooftop solar with 200MW being set as the highest solar generation allowed per Taluk to ensure a widespread installation. In order to pursue the target several solar parks, schemes such as the Surya Raitha, awareness drives for the farmer as well as a keen focus towards distributed solar have been started. The Government of Karnataka is committed towards ensuring that at least 20% of the total power in the state is generated by the renewable sources of energy by 2020.