Mumbai, Aug. 28 -- Bernstein has reported that rooftop solar and the Kisan Urja Suraksha evam Utthaan Mahabhiyan scheme accounted for around 40 per cent of India's solar capacity additions in the year to date of FY27 through July, making decentralised projects key drivers of renewable growth as utility scale projects faced transmission-related constraints.
The brokerage noted the shift in composition of solar additions towards rooftop and KUSUM as a notable change in the current fiscal. Bernstein recalled that India recorded strong renewable additions in FY26, adding 45 gigawatt (GW) of solar and six GW of wind capacity, and that rooftop and KUSUM had contributed 22 per cent of solar capacity added that year.
The report said the share of decentralised installations has risen sharply in FY27 through July, with rooftop and KUSUM emerging as major contributors to incremental solar capacity. The brokerage presented the data as evidence of growing uptake of distributed generation even as utility scale assets awaited transmission upgrades.
The report also referred to projections by the Central Electricity Authority that suggest renewable additions could plateau and moderate over the next one to two years as transmission infrastructure catches up, a formulation that introduces an element of uncertainty into capacity forecasts. Policy measures aim to support decentralised deployment, with the PM Surya Ghar target to install rooftop solar systems in 10 million (mn) households with a combined capacity of 30 GW by the end of the financial year. Industry observers said the scheme and the KUSUM programme together are reshaping the investment and deployment landscape for solar in India.
The shift towards rooftop and KUSUM underscores the importance of distributed solutions in meeting national renewables objectives while utility scale projects await grid augmentation. Bernstein suggested that monitoring of transmission capacity and pace of grid upgrades will be critical to sustaining overall additions. The findings point to a near term era in which decentralised generation plays an outsized role in incremental capacity.
Published by HT Digital Content Services with permission from Construction World.