India's Largest Solar Power plant at Krnool

In just about two years of its conception, much of the 1,000 MW Kurnool Ultra Mega-Solar Park (KUMSP) at Orvakal in Kurnool district, which is the world’s largest solar power plant at any single location, took shape and it is already generating 900 MW of the clean energy. The remaining installation is poised to be completed in a couple of months.

Spread over 5,812 acres of parched landscape at Gani and Sakunala villages, the KUMSP has a staggering 40,00,000 solar panels of 315 watts each currently producing 90% of the installed capacity and connected to the nearby four 220/33 kV pooling stations of 250 MW each and a 400 / 220kV grid substation through a maze of cables measuring a mammoth 2,000 circuit kilometres. These facilities have been created with a Central grant of Rs. 200 crore.

The Kurnool Ultra Mega Solar Park is just the beginning. The Andhra Pradesh government has another massive 1,500 MW solar park slated in the region of Kadapa, and two more large scale solar parks nearing completion. With an additional 2,750 MW of solar energy set to be added to the state’s energy mix, Andhra Pradesh is the one of the leading Indian states in solar energy—neck-in-neck with Telangana, Gujarat, Rajasthan and Tamil Nadu.

India’s solar energy progress:

At the start of India’s National Solar Mission in 2010, India had a mere 17 MW of installed solar energy with the aim of 20 GW by 2020. Many criticized the Solar Mission’s 20 GW as “too ambitious” for India at the time. Just a few years later, India has ramped up the its solar target to 100 GW of solar power by 2022—a five-fold increase, and is home to the largest solar park in the world.

India currently has over 12 GW of solar energy, and plans to achieve a total of 20 GW of solar energy by March 2018. Yes, much more needs to be done, but the progress is remarkable. And with the climate talks coming up in Bonn in a few weeks, India is demonstrating real clean energy progress on the ground.