Large-scale solar projects accounted for 78% of the total installations in India with 2.52 GW in 2020.

While the industry is upbeat about the prospects in 2021, the second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic has again cast a shadow of uncertainty on the ongoing projects around the country.

Adani Solar led the way in terms of large-scale solar in 2020, with projects commissioned at various locations in Gujarat, Rajasthan, and Uttar Pradesh, accounting for 13% of the total installations in 2020, according to Mercom’s recently released report India Solar Market Leaderboard 2021.

Hero Future Energies and SB Energy rounded off the top three rankings with 12% and 10% of the market share. The top three developers accounted for 35% of the total utility-scale solar projects installed in 2020.

In CY 2020, the top ten developers accounted for the majority of the projects completed with 69% of the total utility-scale solar installations.

Adani also led the way in projects under development, with a pipeline of over 10 GW of utility-scale solar power projects, followed closely by Azure Power, and ReNew Power.

Adani also topped the list of utility-scale solar project developers with the largest portfolio of installed capacity cumulatively. Other top large developers in the category include ACME Solar, ReNew Power, Tata Power Renewable, and Azure Power.

In the first half (1H) of 2020, Hero Future Energies, SB Energy, and Aditya Birla had emerged as the top utility-scale solar project developers. Together, the three solar developers had accounted for nearly 64% of total large-scale installations in 1H 2020.

Recently, India’s cumulative solar installations hit the 40 GW milestone.

Solar power also recently hit another significant milestone this year as the share of solar power in India’s installed power capacity mix reached 10.3%, exceeding that of wind-based power sources for the first time. The share of installed wind capacity stood at 10.25%.