Websol Energy mulling solar manufacturing capacity expansion

The crystalline solar cells and modules manufacturer—which has 200 MW of cell line and 250 MW of module line capacity—has secured orders equal to full production capacity for both cells and modules till March 2020.

November 25, 2019 Uma Gupta

An increased demand from domestic content requirement (DCR) projects is driving solar manufacturing capacity expansion in India.

Image: Orb Energy

Websol Energy System—which has an installed capacity of 200 MW for cells and 250 MW for modules at Falta special economic zone in West Bengal—is assessing solar manufacturing capacity expansion in view of an increased demand from domestic content requirement (DCR) projects.

Currently, while India has solar cell manufacturing capacity of just 1200 MW (operational and available for sale), the state of Gujarat alone has already awarded 650 MW of DCR projects, which are to be completed by March 2020 with domestic cells. Tenders from other states are awaited—as per the company statement.

Notably, “Websol Energy System has secured orders equal to full production capacity for both cell and module till March 2020. Future orders are under negotiation as per suitable timeline and production capacity”—the company said.

“We have booked full capacity of 250 MW, i.e., 20.83 MW per month module line with Vikram Solar on contractual basis till June 2020. 50% capacity of cell line, i.e., 8.33 MW per month, has also been booked with Vikram Solar till June 2020 and rest 50% capacity, i.e., 8.33 MW per month, has been booked with retail customers for an order quantity ranging between 500 KW and 1 MW (per month) each till September 2020”—it added.

Domestic content requirement

The Indian Government has mandated that preference be given to domestically manufactured renewable energy products in public procurement. For grid-connected solar power projects, the minimum percentage of domestically manufactured content required is 100% for solar cells and modules and 40% for other components, such as inverters.

Further, the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy has recently clarified that “solar cells manufactured using imported diffused silicon wafer (generally called ‘blue wafer’) shall not qualify as domestically manufactured for getting benefits under government schemes.”

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