Domestic solar panels to get only EPC, subsidy-backed projects

Decision will help India's Solar Mission become WTO compliant

As India faces heat at the World Trade Organisation (WTO) for giving preference to domestic solar manufacturers in its renewable energy programme, the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) has made changes to the content sourcing policy. This comes at a time when the domestic solar manufacturing industry has sought safeguards and anti-dumping duty on import of solar panels from China and Malaysia.

In its latest communication to the industry, the MNRE has directed all states/Central PSUs to not take any “new projects with Domestic Content Requirement (DCR) under the developer mode”. Besides, replacement of old solar cells/modules from