Combining wind and solar — a game changer for India? - video Dailymotion

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Wind-solar hybrid systems offer many advantages over their stand-alone counterparts. The state of Gujarat in particular is investing in the technology. Could it help India cut fossil fuels? Check out the pros and cons of this emerging technology.

Transcript

00:00 Babra, in Gujarat, is a town of 25,000 people.

00:07 It doesn't look unusual.

00:09 But when the farmers head out to their fields in the morning, they now pass an imposing

00:15 power plant.

00:17 It's a hybrid solar and wind farm, spanning 650 hectares of land.

00:22 The plant produces clean electricity from wind and the sun at the same time.

00:27 Gujarat offers ideal conditions for the hybrid system.

00:31 Situated near the Tropic of Cancer and the Arabian Sea, it has plenty of wind and more

00:36 than 300 days of sunshine a year.

00:39 Power operators have long since discovered the region.

00:42 Why we chose these locations for wind-solar hybrid projects?

00:48 So this region in terms of the elevation, in terms of the radiation is better.

00:53 So when you compare to other districts in Gujarat, then we found a better elevation

00:59 for WTG generation.

01:01 Hybrid systems offer a decisive advantage.

01:05 By day, they utilise the energy of both the sun and the wind, and even when the sun goes

01:10 down, they still generate power from the wind.

01:14 India has so far commissioned hybrid plants with a capacity of 1.4 gigawatts.

01:19 That's about the equivalent to one and a half modern coal-fired power stations.

01:25 And that volume is expected to increase more than six-fold by the end of next year.

01:31 Experts believe the high investment costs linked to these plants will drop as major

01:36 operators enter the market.

01:38 Ultimately, these large players will help to cut off the cost.

01:43 Dependency on manufacturing will reduce.

01:47 And they will also create the jobs also, and a kind of competition will be created.

01:53 So definitely these large players are required in order to make the system more affordable.

02:00 CleanMax is one such player.

02:02 The company derives about a quarter of its revenues from hybrid solar wind plants.

02:07 Its clean electricity is sold to industrial customers across Gujarat.

02:12 The power plants are also an opportunity for the people of Babra.

02:16 The company says it runs targeted campaigns to recruit workers from the local area.

02:22 Directly or indirectly, 200 or 300 people are currently involved in the CleanMax initiative.

02:30 One can only imagine how many people will be employed once a project begins in full

02:34 swing.

02:36 Around an hour and a half's drive from Babra is the city of Rajkot.

02:41 Piyush Bagadia runs a small company here, manufacturing hybrid systems.

02:47 But these systems are much smaller and designed to work independently of the central power

02:52 grids.

02:53 He tells us how it all began.

02:59 In my village of Durasiya, we used to have problems with electricity.

03:03 We didn't have solar and would experience frequent power cuts.

03:07 In 2010, when I was in grade 10, I made a wind turbine and installed it in my house.

03:13 That's how I started this business.

03:16 Now our power systems go to places that have no other source of electricity.

03:21 They use our off-grid models.

03:29 His company has so far set up systems in schools, forests, tribal zones and coastal areas.

03:36 A typical system like these would cost between 5 and 6 lakh rupees or around 6,600 euros.

03:46 Globally, there's only one option for storage and that is batteries.

03:53 Power can only be saved through a battery.

03:55 But the battery cost is high.

03:57 And so the hybrid model is expensive right now because of the battery.

04:03 Today, Piyush is visiting a client in a city suburb.

04:08 Anand Sankparia runs his own business and has been testing the hybrid system on his

04:13 roof for two months now.

04:16 He was already using solar power before, but now his energy bills are just a quarter of

04:21 what they were.

04:24 One drawback of solar energy was that it only provided power during the day.

04:29 But because I am now using the solar and wind hybrid model, I get an uninterrupted supply

04:34 24 hours a day.

04:36 That's a huge improvement.

04:39 Big name companies still dominate the market for wind-solar hybrid systems.

04:44 But Piyush Bagaria is betting on a future in which smaller firms like his can secure

04:50 a niche to supply the technology for smaller scale use like households.

04:58 The government recently announced a policy for this sector.

05:01 So now those in solar energy will also start manufacturing wind turbines.

05:06 Many people are already preparing for it.

05:09 The market right now has a lot of solar.

05:12 But in about a year, it will be flooded with wind turbines too.

05:16 There will be a lot of competition.

05:26 India is already the world's fourth largest producer of renewable energy, following China,

05:32 the US and Brazil.

05:34 But it still generates most of its electricity by burning fossil fuels.

05:39 The government has an ambitious plan.

05:41 By 2050, it wants half of the electricity generated in the country to come from renewables.

05:48 Experts say hybrid power plants that combine the forces of solar and wind could be key

05:54 to achieving that goal.

05:56 [MUSIC PLAYING]

Combining wind and solar — a game changer for India?

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