Piyush Goyal asks US firms to invest in clean energy market in India

Washington: India has asked US firms to come up with innovative solutions to address the massive energy needs of Asia's third largest economy, which is set to become the largest clean energy market in the next decade.

Addressing a meeting of high level gathering of US companies in the renewable energy development and financing sector, Energy Minister Piyush Goyal said that India offers tremendous investment opportunities to American energy firms.

While acknowledging constraining factors, the minister asked American companies to be a partner in this process and to help come up with innovative solutions so as not to miss out on the tremendous opportunity in India which is set to become the largest clean energy market in the next 10 years.

Addressing the concerns and challenges faced by investors in India, Goyal laid out the government's vision for achieving the ambitious target of 175 GW of clean energy by 2022, a media release said.

He addressed concerns relating to the fiscal health of distribution companies in India and said that the government was looking for a long term and sustainable solution to the problem which will be implemented soon.

A number of stalled projects are also being cleared, Goyal told the investors at the meeting organised by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) in partnership with the American Council on a Renewable Energy (ACORE).

Praising the government's efforts in scaling up the clean energy sector, Chandrajit Banerjee, director general, CII said Indian industry stands ready to partner and work with the government to achieve the ambitious target set by the Prime Minister.

Sumant Sinha, chairman and CEO, Renew a Power Ventures pointed out that USD 150 million of financing is required in the clean energy space of which USD 100 million will be debt and USD 50 million will be equity.

"The US can play a big role in this space in India," he said.

The US companies which attended the meeting included SunEdison, Bank of America, First Solar, Credit Suisse, Apex clean energy, Sun Power and Deutsche Bank.

A high powered CII CEOs delegation, including Preetha Reddy, Apollo Hospitals; Kiran Mazumdar Shah, Biocon; Shiv Khemka, Sun Group; Rajan Navani, Jetline Group; Pranav Tanti,Suzlon; Rahul Munjal, Hero Future Energies and Kishore Nair, Welspun Energy also participated in the event.

CII and ACORE yesterday signed a Memorandum of Understanding to help solidify and bolster cooperation in the clean energy sector through facilitation of dialogues between industry experts, the development of platforms to deepen cooperation as well as platforms to exchange policy recommendations and best practices.