Wind capacity installations in India rose 168% year-over-year (YoY) to 737.9 MW in the first quarter (Q1) of the calendar year 2023.

Installations grew 222% quarter-over-quarter (QoQ) from 229.2 MW in Q4 2022.

The surge in installations is primarily due to the introduction of the Renewable Purchase Obligation (RPO) and Energy Storage Obligation (ESO) trajectory until 2029-2030 by the government, which specified that wind RPO will be met only by energy produced from wind power projects commissioned after March 31, 2022.

It also notified the percentage of the total energy that can be consumed from solar and wind projects with storage.

The country’s total wind installations by the end of Q1 2023 stood at 42.6 GW, up 6% YoY.

Tamil Nadu led the states with a total installed wind capacity of 10 GW at the end of the first quarter, contributing 23.5% to the country’s total capacity. The state installed 81.2 MW of new wind capacity in Q1.

Gujarat came in a close second with a 9.9 GW cumulative installed capacity. It added 118.3 MW of new wind capacity during the January-March period.

Karnataka and Maharashtra’s total installed wind capacity by the end of March 2023 stood at 5.2 GW and 5 GW, respectively.

While Karnataka stood third, adding 26.8 MW of new wind capacity during Q1, Maharashtra was fourth but had no new capacity additions during the quarter.

Rajasthan stood fifth on the list with a cumulative installed wind capacity of 5.1 GW by the end of March 2023, followed by Andhra Pradesh with 4 GW.

However, Rajasthan topped the chart in quarterly capacity addition with 511.6 MW of wind capacity.

Madhya Pradesh ended up in a seventh place with a total installed wind capacity of 2.8 GW by the end of March 2023. There was no new capacity added during Q1.

In the fourth quarter of 2022, total wind capacity installations stood at 229 MW, up 8% YoY.

However, in the October-December quarter of 2022, installations fell by 74% QoQ from 878 MW in Q3 2022. The sequential decline was primarily attributable to the commissioning of unusually high capacity in the third quarter when several pending projects from Q2 rolled over to the subsequent quarter.