India's Power Sector

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hanumadu
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by hanumadu »

The only way all that capacity will be utilized is if people start using more power. People will start using more power only if power becomes cheaper. I am confident NM Is working on making power available to all and cheaper too so more economic activity is generated.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Suraj »

Meanwhile, installed capacity is up to ~330GW
Installed power capacity, April 2017
We overtook Japan for #3 spot last year.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Mort Walker »

JohnTitor wrote:
Mort Walker wrote:Thermal power can also come from natural gas. What we need is to have a base load capacity that will get us through economic growth in to 2030. From there we can have the "green energy" in the mix to take care of peak load. The goal should be no more than Rs. 3/- per unit for residential use and no more than Rs. 2/- per unit for industrial and commercial use.

In the quest for green we forget the west developed with very cheap power. Without cheap power, India will NEVER develop.
1.) India has around 300-320 clear days a year! There is no shortage of sunlight. In fact, its quite the opposite, it is so hot throughout the year due to the lack of clouds and rain.

2.) Nuclear energy can be used as a base load as it is steady and lasts 30+ years. Longer term, we can move to fusion and various storage systems.

3.) Except, we can't afford to pollute our air. Air pollution is a major health issue as it stands today in india, what with all the diesel cars, trucks and busses spewing fumes. This is directly linked to cancer. Air pollution is known to cause damage to the immune, endocrine and reproductive systems.

4.) Its not about doing what the west asks or playing second fiddle. This has direct consequences of those who live in india. Is that the sort of environment you would want your kids to grow up in?
1.) Sun light provides 1000W/m^2 without any losses. The problem is that photovoltaics are inefficient (about 20% efficient in production) and there are losses storing in batteries too. It doesn't mean you don't do solar, but use it to handle peak load during the day. The issue becomes cost per unit.

2.) I agree. Fusion is the way to go in the long term.

3.) Natural gas and clean coal plants produce much less pollution. Air pollution around our metros are caused by not having cheap reliable power - having to use diesel generators, cost of transportation fuel - burning diesel or kerosene, and in places like Delhi burning of whatever is available for heat during the winter. Cheap electricity would certainly help bring in electric cars.

4.) Do not confuse climate change with air pollution. Two different things.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Mort Walker »

Suraj wrote:Meanwhile, installed capacity is up to ~330GW
Installed power capacity, April 2017
We overtook Japan for #3 spot last year.
Thank you, Suraj.

We can all see:
Coal produced 194.4GW/329.2GW = 59% of all power in India.
Solar produced 12.3GW/329.2GW = 3.7% of all power in India.
Gas produced 25.3GW/329.2GW = 7.6% of all power in India.
Nuclear produced 6.7GW/329.2GW = 2% of all power in India.

The danger is that if solar is given too much importance, then tariff rates will become too high exceeding real income growth and inflation. Nuclear, clean coal and natural gas is the only way to go.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Supratik »

Mort,

According to Indian business magazines, deals in solar and wind have been done recently at rates at par with thermal. Several thermal projects are in doldrums as there is less appetite from investors. India now has excess capacity as Suraj's post shows. The problem is demand and delivery not production. About half of that capacity is idle becoz there is no demand (Business Insider). People have to have the purchasing power to buy all that electricity and the discoms have to have the ability to deliver it.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Mort Walker »

Installed power capacity, Feb. 2017

Coal produced 189GW/315.4GW = 60% of all power in India in Feb. 2017.

However, we can see that coal power production increased from 189GW to over 194GW in just two months from Feb. to Apr. 2017. I'm glad that the Modi govt. has not abandoned coal and understands power issues as well as economics.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Mort Walker »

Supratik wrote:Mort,

According to Indian business magazines, deals in solar and wind have been done recently at rates at par with thermal. Several thermal projects are in doldrums as there is less appetite from investors. India now has excess capacity as Suraj's post shows. The problem is demand and delivery not production. About half of that capacity is idle becoz there is no demand (Business Insider). People have to have the purchasing power to buy all that electricity and the discoms have to have the ability to deliver it.
People do not have the purchasing power when it is over Rs. 6/unit. People can afford air conditioners, but they can't afford to operate them at such high rates. Similarly, industrial operations pay a higher retail rate for power than consumers. It is mixed up, power needs to be cheaper for commercial and industrial use over consumer use. That will spur GDP growth.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Mort Walker »

hanumadu wrote:The only way all that capacity will be utilized is if people start using more power. People will start using more power only if power becomes cheaper. I am confident NM Is working on making power available to all and cheaper too so more economic activity is generated.
Subsidse it. Those who have filed and payed income taxes will receive discount per unit of power. The more taxes you've paid as an individual or corporation, the lower your power bill.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Suraj »

Mort Walker wrote:Installed power capacity, Feb. 2017

Coal produced 189GW/315.4GW = 60% of all power in India in Feb. 2017.

However, we can see that coal power production increased from 189GW to over 194GW in just two months from Feb. to Apr. 2017. I'm glad that the Modi govt. has not abandoned coal and understands power issues as well as economics.
GoI has not abandoned coal. Coal production is on target for 700MT this year, and on track to achieve GoI's goal for 1000MT by 2019-20.

The source I find we haven't been building fast enough is not coal or wind/solar, but nuclear. Still stick at same level, with only KNPP-2 coming online recently.

Solar is growing very fast. We were at 2GW capacity in 2014. In 2015-16 it was 6.7GW. In 2016-17 it doubled to 12.5GW. IIRC, about 15GW is under implementation currently.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Mort Walker »

^^^Thanks again.

Which means coal will supply nearly 60% of India's power through 2020. The goal should be to bring down price per unit now.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Suraj »

There's not going to be any significant change in near term source composition anytime soon. Rather, what's happening is a significant focus on getting things done. The 100GW solar goal (60GW dedicated, 40GW rooftop) by 2022, which sounded in the 'someone must be smoking something' category when announced, is within the realm of real possibility now. In just one year, we rose ~5 spots from #10 or so, to ~#5 now, in installed solar capacity by overtaking a whole bunch of Euro minions. In another 2 years, we'll overtake everyone else except China, including traditional bigwigs like Germany and US. Currently we only have China, Germany, Japan and US ahead of us, and we'll overtake half of those within the next 2 years.

On top of that, CIL is being forced to perform, and coal production has been opened up to the private sector, breaking a decades long GoI monopoly dating from the mid 1970s before even I was born.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Mort Walker »

^^^Which shows that production capacity is increasing more than distribution and consumption rates. At current tariff structure this will lead to under utilization and bankrupt private power producers by 2020-2022. This is not good. Power consumption must increase, but is only possible if price per unit comes down.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Suraj »

Increasing distribution and consumption is 'trivial' (to misuse a much misused Rahul Mehta term). Disha posted earlier about how electricity consumption in UP is up 30% in a matter of months. There's an often stated argument that demand is slack. I'm not sure I agree with that. I see the problem as a pricing and distribution issue.

Rapidly growing core sector capability is often a two part policymaking effort, first focusing on the build it part, and second on the make them come part. PRC does that quite often. It's presumed that it's 'build it and they will come', but in reality, the second part is also a significant policy action in itself.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Prasad »

Discom financial health also plays a big part in this doesn't it.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Suraj »

Yes, that was the goal of UDAY.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by sohamn »

Mort Walker wrote:
The danger is that if solar is given too much importance, then tariff rates will become too high exceeding real income growth and inflation. Nuclear, clean coal and natural gas is the only way to go.
How will tariff rates become exceedingly high when solar tarrifs have beat coal? And clean coal is a myth propagated by American evil corporates.

India should stop thermal and initiate solar thermal, wind and solar as they have become on par or even cheaper than coal. Follow that up with nuclear and convert exciting coal to coal + gas.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by guru.shetty »

Solar + battery Storage is at 11 cents/ kwh or Rs 7/kwh (based on deal at kauai by Tesla energy). What most people are not thinking about is that Indian industries will ditch the grid in a few years at these rates. Cross subsidization wont be possible after that.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by hanumadu »

Indian houses will ditch the grid in a few years at these rates!!
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Rishirishi »

Mort Walker wrote:^^^Thanks again.

Which means coal will supply nearly 60% of India's power through 2020. The goal should be to bring down price per unit now.

If it is good for the planet, it does not automatically have to be bad for the pocket :)

solar and wind power is very cheap now. Banks are simply refusing to finance new coal plants. New coal plants cant compete with solar power, but old plants can compete with new installed solar power.
The power tariffs do not reflect the real cost for coal. It causes a lot of local pollution (try living within 5km of a coal power plant). Transportation of coal is also a great problem.

As for solar and wind it is really cheap. The best part is the prices just drop for each year. RS 3 per unit today will be a lot less then RS 3 per unit in 10 years time.

STORAGE of power
You do NOT need batteries to store electricity. The hydro electric plants can be used for that. You pump up the water during the daytime (or when ever there is oversupply and use the water when ever required.


The coal plants need to be shut down as soon as possible. They case massive harm to local and global environment, eat a lot of the capacity for rail.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by vasu raya »

Coal is bad, however west has done its damage already like their extinct wildlife but will play judge on India's conservation efforts

To forgo coal India needs help and investment in these,

Offshore wind turbines and an efficient grid connected to,
Pumped storage which is possible at GW scale if mountanous terrain such as in J&K is used, we can pitch that clean energy goals can be met should west give India support there as well.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Mort Walker »

guru.shetty wrote:Solar + battery Storage is at 11 cents/ kwh or Rs 7/kwh (based on deal at kauai by Tesla energy). What most people are not thinking about is that Indian industries will ditch the grid in a few years at these rates. Cross subsidization wont be possible after that.
Where did you come up with 11 cents/KWHr? The article says:
Instead, the utility contracted with Tesla to purchase electricity. There’s a 20-year contract in place to buy the solar-generated power for 13.9 cents per kilowatt hour — in effect, Tesla is now in the power generation business.
That is the wholesale price to the utility and by the time the utility sells it to residential and commercial users, it will be over 15 cents/KWHr. That is VERY expensive at over Rs. 10/unit. For an island that makes sense and is better than diesel, but for mainland India those rates are impractical.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Mort Walker »

Rishirishi wrote:
Mort Walker wrote:^^^Thanks again.

Which means coal will supply nearly 60% of India's power through 2020. The goal should be to bring down price per unit now.

If it is good for the planet, it does not automatically have to be bad for the pocket :)

solar and wind power is very cheap now. Banks are simply refusing to finance new coal plants. New coal plants cant compete with solar power, but old plants can compete with new installed solar power.
The power tariffs do not reflect the real cost for coal. It causes a lot of local pollution (try living within 5km of a coal power plant). Transportation of coal is also a great problem.

As for solar and wind it is really cheap. The best part is the prices just drop for each year. RS 3 per unit today will be a lot less then RS 3 per unit in 10 years time.

STORAGE of power
You do NOT need batteries to store electricity. The hydro electric plants can be used for that. You pump up the water during the daytime (or when ever there is oversupply and use the water when ever required.


The coal plants need to be shut down as soon as possible. They case massive harm to local and global environment, eat a lot of the capacity for rail.
You can believe what ever you want, but GoI is committed to 1000MTonnes of coal production by 2020 and idle coal power plants will be put to operation. Very few new plants will be needed and existing plants will be upgraded. Coal will remain nearly 2/3 of India's power production for the next few years.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Mort Walker »

sohamn wrote:How will tariff rates become exceedingly high when solar tarrifs have beat coal?
For 24 hour power it is high because you need batteries for storage. We are at least 15 years away from solar being competitive. There have been some recent breakthroughs in labs to get near 50% photovoltaic efficiencies.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by guru.shetty »

Where did you come up with 11 cents/KWHr?
The below link and a few others local to hawaii quote 11 cents/kwh.
https://arstechnica.com/buxiness/2017/0 ... rom-tesla/

Even if it is 13.9 cents/kwhr, it is still Rs 9/kwhr which is the similar to what Indian industry pays retail.



That is the wholesale price to the utility and by the time the utility sells it to residential and commercial users, it will be over 15 cents/KWHr. That is VERY expensive at over Rs. 10/unit. For an island that makes sense and is better than diesel, but for mainland India those rates are impractical.
Solar + Storage is not like building a new coal power plant. Large scale industries can easily do it in a few days. Prices of Lithium ion batteries are down 70% in the last 2 years and is expected (according to Elon Musk) to reduce further by 75% by 2020 to reach $100/kwh.

Solar + Lithium ion batteries are already a rage in Australia for residential systems as they beat utility retail prices.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Gyan »

Solar PV alone without subsidies in India is around Rs 4 per unit. With li-ion battery around 8. But for energy security we need thermal solar plus molten salt storage which will go up Rs 12 per unit.

We need to explore offshore wind also. But again costs would be high even without storage. Rs 12 +

In addition we will have to build efficient cross country transmission network.

Having said that, foreign nuclear plants are not cheap. Costs are coming to Rs 12 per unit.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Suraj »

Does anyone have data on what fraction of solar cells installed in India are produced within India ? Moser Baer was the leader in this field IIRC.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Mort Walker »

guru.shetty wrote: The below link and a few others local to hawaii quote 11 cents/kwh.
https://arstechnica.com/buxiness/2017/0 ... rom-tesla/

Even if it is 13.9 cents/kwhr, it is still Rs 9/kwhr which is the similar to what Indian industry pays retail.

Solar + Storage is not like building a new coal power plant. Large scale industries can easily do it in a few days. Prices of Lithium ion batteries are down 70% in the last 2 years and is expected (according to Elon Musk) to reduce further by 75% by 2020 to reach $100/kwh.

Solar + Lithium ion batteries are already a rage in Australia for residential systems as they beat utility retail prices.
Elon Musk is promising the sky for a lot of things, but we'll see if they can manage it at that price, and if others can do it - which at this time they can't.

Solar + batteries may make sense for some large scale industries, but it is a capital expenditure and not their core business. For a large country like India to put the majority of its resources in solar to establish the base load doesn't make sense. It is NOT happening and coal production is increasing. That is reality.

For rooftop residences and offices, solar makes a lot of sense, but they aren't buying power off the grid and aren't supporting it. This makes power more expensive for everyone. Solar power should be taxed to support the grid. Slap an additional GST luxury tax on solar panels to support the transmission infrastructure.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Mort Walker »

Gyan wrote:Solar PV alone without subsidies in India is around Rs 4 per unit. With li-ion battery around 8. But for energy security we need thermal solar plus molten salt storage which will go up Rs 12 per unit.
Where are you getting the figure or Rs. 4-8/unit of PVs in India?
Gyan wrote:We need to explore offshore wind also. But again costs would be high even without storage. Rs 12 +
Offshore wind works for Europe where they don't have annual cyclones and strong winds. None of the offshore wind turbines are rated for more than Category 1 hurricane winds.
Gyan wrote: In addition we will have to build efficient cross country transmission network.
Having said that, foreign nuclear plants are not cheap. Costs are coming to Rs 12 per unit.
Power will have to be Rs. 3/unit if India is to develop quickly.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by hanumadu »

Piyush Goyal is on record saying that if Modi's target of 175GW renewable energy by 2022 is achieved, we will not be needing any more new thermal plants after that. I will take his numbers any day over our speculation. Also, there have been many reports of India likely exceeding its commitment of renewable energy component (40%) by 2030.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Mort Walker »

Who cares what Goyal says? It's what is done and happening as the numbers show. Coal is not disappearing and that is not speculation. We can believe all of the nonsense the west is telling us, but reality is very different. Physics is a cruel mistress.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Supratik »

So we should believe you more than Piyush Goyel who doesn't know what he is talking about and is blindly following western myth.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Gyan »

India also has to develop a advanced battery based on metals available abundantly in India. But it seems that Aluminium based batteries are nowhere near commercialisation.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Mort Walker »

Supratik wrote:So we should believe you more than Piyush Goyel who doesn't know what he is talking about and is blindly following western myth.
I guess you can't read because I never asked you to believe me. Look at the production numbers and see for yourself.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Mort Walker »

Gyan wrote:India also has to develop a advanced battery based on metals available abundantly in India. But it seems that Aluminium based batteries are nowhere near commercialisation.
Battery chemistries will always be fraught with problems. The solution will be with fuel cells to achieve the necessary energy densities.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Supratik »

What production numbers? The number for renewables has been posted above. They are more than 100 GW. If it is based on false ideas it is going to lead to energy and economic crisis. I would rather trust a performing govt minister rather than someone throwing things around under a pseudo-name. Stop pretending you are some kind of expert. The worldwide trend is away from thermal to renewables.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Supratik »

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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Supratik »

There is an entire issue in one of the business mags - perhaps Business Today or Business Insider which talks about the economics of renewables. If I find it I will post the link.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Supratik »

Here are the latest deals and their tariffs.

http://www.livemint.com/Industry/zW5Lf1 ... evers.html
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Mort Walker »

Supratik wrote:What production numbers? The number for renewables has been posted above. They are more than 100 GW. If it is based on false ideas it is going to lead to energy and economic crisis. I would rather trust a performing govt minister rather than someone throwing things around under a pseudo-name. Stop pretending you are some kind of expert. The worldwide trend is away from thermal to renewables.
Look at the production numbers linked to what Suraj posted. They are from the Central Electrical Authority of India. Power produced from coal and solar are increasing. There is no decline in coal power production. Again, you refuse to see the facts and deliberately sticking your head in the sand.

Solar power has a place, but economics of large scale production are questionable without subsidies or by artificially taxing high density energy sources. We may in fact see private power production in India take a big hit due to excess capacity caused by high cost per unit.
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Re: India's Power Sector

Post by Suraj »

Another useful link besides the monthly stats from CEA:
Power Sector At A Glance: Power Ministry

Both the CEA and powermin.nic.in links are worth bookmarking for monthly updates.
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