Mr S K Roy Choudhury, Chairman, G P Tronics Pvt Ltd, comments on the present scenario on the solar power generation front.

What is the current state of solar power in India?

Solar power in India has undergone a paradigm shift. The government plans to take India’s renewable energy capacity to 175 GW by 2022, which comprises 100 GW solar, 60 GW wind, 10 GW from biomass and 5 GW from small hydro powers. As of June 2016, the installed capacity of wind power in India was 27,151 MW (27 GW), mainly spread across South, West and North regions. Though the cumulative installed grid connected capacity of solar power for the same date is only 8,062 MW (8 GW), solar power generation is expected to increase at a much faster pace and will soon surpass the wind power generation capacity in the country.

What are the factors in favour of solar? How can rooftops become attractive?

The advantage of rooftop solar plants is that the roofs of residential/commercial buildings are normally unused except some installation of water tanks. Proper design and selection of equipment can generate power without any time lag as there is no civil work involved followed by the project cost will be much on the lower side. There is thus ready space for setting up the necessary string inverter installation.

As per the MNRE guidelines government offices should have rooftop solar power systems installed to meet their day-to-day power consumption requirements, which will lead to reduced electricity bills as solar power has a short payback period.

What are the technology challenges?

As on date, there are hardly any Indian companies with knowhow to manufacture string inverters as per international standards, meeting all the quality requirements and standards. Imported string inverters are costly. Domestic manufacturers are certainly working on this and once that happens, the prices of string inverters will come down, which will ultimately make solar systems more popular.

What are the various types of inverters used in solar power?

Broadly there are three types of inverters used in solar power installation:

Off grid – where there is no electricity a solar module through the charge controller charges the battery during the day time and discharges during night time for a limited period of power supply

Hybrid – Grid is available but there are frequent interruptions (power outage or low voltage) in such cases there is automatic monitoring and if need be, switching over to the inverter mode for uninterrupted power supply and return to mains after checking the permissible voltage window, and

On grid – This system does not require battery back-up as such, it reduces the recurring cost of battery replacement. In develop countries where the power outage problem is non interacted and voltage and frequency are stable, it works in day time when solar power is available and converts PVDC voltage to AC grid to maintain appropriate voltage and frequency.

What are the main obstacles in smooth implementation of solar policy?

Solar power needs more awareness through appropriate government policies.

The basic reason is high capital initial investment whereas recurring expenditure is almost nil. In comparison with any other power sources solar power generation is cheaper and breakeven is in between 4-5 yrs and balance period of power is free.

Solar power can certainly be adopted at the domestic level, but this needs more awareness through appropriate government policies. The European model of preferential tariff for export to the grid will create interest among all sections of electricity users.

Once the users understand the benefits they will go for their own solar power plant for commercial benefits. Low rate of interest of borrowing for purchase of this power plant will create more interest as the breakeven will be faster and there is additional return after the payback. This could be a model of successful use of solar power to boost the national grid thereby slowing down installation of new (conventional) power plants.

What is the Company’s history?

G P Tronics Pvt Ltd (GPT) is a 38-year-old company based in Kolkata and deals in power electronic products with solar power equipment like inverters, MPPT chargers, data loggers, etc. GPT has its own R&D unit and it manufactures inverters with off-grid and hybrid applications with capacities of 1 kVA-10 kVA. The company, which is ISO 9001: 2008 and ISO 14001: 2004 certified, is also empanelled with MNRE as an approved manufacturer for solar inverters.

What is the status of the new plant of GP Tronics?

We have set up our new factory only 18 months ago and are presently designing a product, which can monitor its own performance with in-built SCADA system. This is fully digitalised and with competitive pricing, but with highest number of parameter monitoring, will help us capture the market. At this point of time we are concentrating on domestic market.

?How is present business environment?

The changes in government approach regarding subsidy and implementation of new solar policy is now accelerating the growth as evident from statistics.

?What are the future plans?

We have a few negotiations being conducted on how to harness new technology, which can supplement the market needs. These have high business potential.