Industry body WIPPA suggests 4 measures to boost wind energy progress

Industry body WIPPA on Friday suggested four measures to boost progress in the wind energy sector.

"At the central government, we request the implementation of the four policies implementation of the bidding plan, ISTS (inter-state transmission system) open access, fixing the missing links in LPS (late payment surcharge) and greater facilitation of offshore wind bids," Wind Independent Power Producers Association (WIPPA) president Parag Sharma said in a statement.

The body, with the support of the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE), will organise an event on Sunday to increase awareness of wind energy ahead of the Global Wind Day on June 15, the statement said.

Global Wind Day run here on June 11, 2023, will highlight the MNRE and WIPPA's role in reviving India's wind sector.

Global Wind Day Conference 2023 was also organised in Pune on Thursday.

Dinesh Dayanand Jagdale, Joint Secretary at MNRE, expressed satisfaction at adding gigawatts on the ground now, and at the robustness of the wind farms being built.

He said, "India is proud of all the hard work being put in by each state, each stakeholder, each discom, each nodal agency. I am confident that with a strong partnership between MahaUrja, MahaDiscom, MNRE, developers, manufacturers, and financiers, we will be able to hand-hold each other and take India's wind journey forward. Going forward, ease of doing business will be taken up very aggressively to meet the country's renewable energy targets".

India had set a target of installing 175 GW of renewable energy capacity by 2022, which included 100 GW from solar, 60 GW from wind, 10 GW from bio-power and 5 GW from small hydro-power.

However, as per official data, 173.619 GW of renewable energy capacity was added till May 31, 2023, of which 43.198 is wind capacity.

WIPPA is an association of wind developers and Independent Power Producers (IPPs) in India representing industry issues and suggestions to the government and non-government authorities associated with wind energy development. Its members have an aggregate capacity of around 12,000 MW and an asset base of more than Rs 60,000 crore.