India added 2.5 gigawatts (GW) of solar open access in 2022, an increase of 92 per cent compared to the 1.3 GW installed in 2021, according to a recent market report.
The report titled ‘2022 Q4 & Annual Mercom India Solar Open Access Market Report’ by Mercom Research, installations reached an all-time high in 2022 as various organizations and developers rushed to finish projects before basic customs duty (BCD) and approved list of models and manufacturers (ALMM) regulations were enacted.
It said that commissioning of projects delayed during the COVID-19 pandemic also added to the total.
The report added that in 2022, Karnataka added the most solar open access capacity, followed by Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu.
“India added 293 MW of solar open access capacity in Q4 2022, down 52 per cent quarter-over-quarter compared to 615 MW installed in Q3 2022. Quarterly installations were down almost 10 per cent year-over-year,” it said.
The top five states contributed over 96 per cent of all open access installations in Q4 2022. Karnataka remained the leading state, accounting for over 32 per cent of capacity addition in the quarter. As of December 2022, the cumulative installed solar open access capacity reached 7.7 GW.
It added that the development pipeline of solar open access projects in the country was 6.6 GW as of Q4 2022 – almost 70 per cent of the pipeline was spread across – Andhra Pradesh, Rajasthan, Karnataka, Maharashtra, and Gujarat.
As of December 2022, Karnataka remained the top state, accounting for almost 36 per cent of cumulative solar open access capacity. Maharashtra followed, making up over 12 per cent of the total installations.
