SoftBank Group's SB Energy, IL&FS to partner for solar parks in India

IL&FS Energy and SoftBank group's SB Energy will form a partnership to develop grid connect solar parks of about 20 gigawatts (GW) in India, IL&FS said in a statement on Monday.

"IL&FS Energy, a subsidiary of IL&FS has partnered with SB Energy (with investments from SoftBank Group International), to jointly develop grid-connected solar parks. These parks will be developed across various locations in India," IL&FS said in its statement.

The company in its release added the development of 20GW by 2025. "The development cost for this capacity is pegged at  $20 billion," said a person with direct knowledge of the development on the condition of anonymity.

Part of the partnership, SB Energy is expected to take up installation, engineering, procurement and construction and financing of the solar projects, while IL&FS will develop the solar park infrastructure like substations, grid connectivity and arrangement for long-term power evacuation. This arrangement will, therefore, result in a "plug and play" solution for SB Energy," according to the company's statement.

"Government of India's thrust on renewable energy is an important component of this agenda and SoftBank is eager to be a stakeholder in this endeavour. Our partnership with IL&FS leverages on the respective strengths of both institutions and will efficiently ground our target rollout plan," said Manoj Kohli, Executive Chairman, SB Energy.

The Union Government has set a target of adding 100GW of solar power by 2022. Both world over and India, with the conscious effort to reduce dependence on fossil fuel, renewable sources like solar are attracting huge investment interest. As of March 2018, India’s total renewable energy capacity stood at 69022 megawatts (MW) of which 21651 megawatt was solar power capacity.