Savings shine bright for existing rooftop solar beneficiaries, big hopes from PM Surya Ghar scheme

The allocation of the earlier rooftop solar scheme was roughly ₹12,000 crores, the government has now decided to give a big boost to the scheme with a ₹75,000 crores allocation. Beneficiaries get 300 units of free electricity per month. Consumers would get subsidies in the range of ₹30,000 to ₹78,000 for solar systems, collateral-free low interest loans and beneficiaries may even earn some income through sale of surplus power generated from their rooftop solar panels to discoms.

Industrial users of solar energy who avail the solar energy subsidy offered by Delhi State, and not Central Subsidies, are also seeing benefits. Matu International, a manufacturer of textile machinery spare parts in East Delhi's Jhilmil Industrial Area, got solar panels installed in 2023 at a cost of ₹50 lakh. While the company doesn't get a power bill for most months of the year as solar energy covers its factory and office's power consumption, it hopes to recover the investment in 3 to 5 years. Around a dozen kilometers away, the Bal Mandir school in Delhi's Laxmi Nagar has also witnessed a significant reduction in its electricity bill due to net metering.

Stressing on the importance of a fully integrated supply chain in India, MNRE Secretary Bhupinder Singh Bhalla termed manufacturing and PLI schemes for high efficiency solar modules as a big focus. But experts say, there are multiple reasons the earlier scheme did not take off as well as earlier expected – from cumbersome paperwork for individuals interested in installing rooftop systems, to finding and negotiating with installation providers, to obtaining clearances from discoms.

Many also point out that beneficiaries have been facing delays in subsidy disbursements. A resident of Greater Kailash in New Delhi, Subhash Jain is still awaiting the subsidy of ₹1.17 lakh which was approved but is yet to be credited to his account. He feels that schemes lose charm among people if money isn't disbursed timely.

Smoothening out many of these wrinkles will mean that the new avatar of the rooftop solar energy scheme sees some strong traction, and that will be a big plus for the government, which hopes that the new and improved scheme will accelerate India’s adoption of solar energy in the overall renewable energy mix and get it closer to its green energy targets.