NEW DELHI: State Bank of India (SBI) on Friday announced financing of rooftop solar projects worth Rs 400 crore with private developers. This would add at least 100 MW of rooftop solar capacity to the grid, and is a significant step towards meeting the government’s target for 40 GW of rooftop solar installations.
SBI has availed loan of $625 million from the World Bank for on-lending to viable Grid-Connected Rooftop Solar PV (GRPV) projects undertaken by photo-voltaic (PV) developers, ggregators and end-users, for installation of rooftop solar systems on the rooftops of commercial, institutional and industrial buildings, a World Bank statement stated. Implementation of the programme by SBI will support the installation of more than 600 MW of rooftop solar capacity.
With the World Bank funded capacity development programme, SBI is making efforts to expand and incentivize the market for rooftop solar power by way of low cost financing, the statement said.
“With the World Bank loan, SBI aims at developing the nascent rooftop solar market. As a tropical country, India has a huge potential to be the leader in the rooftop solar space,” said Karnam Sekar, deputy managing director, SBI.
So far, SBI has sanctioned GRPV projects with aggregate capacity of 100 MW, and proposals are in the pipeline with aggregate capacity of around 125 MW. Going forward, off-take of loan would accelerate as awareness builds up in the market for grid-connected solar rooftop,” he added.