ENERPARC: DELIVERING ZERO EMISSION GREEN ENERGY

About Enerparc: Enerparc Energy Private Limited is a wholly owned subsidiary of Enerparc AG, Germany (7th largest Solar developer in the world outside China). Headquartered in Bengaluru, the company specialises in EPC services for rooftop and ground mounted solar photovoltaic (PV) systems across India with a focus on Commercial & Industrial (C&I) segment.

Enerparc is a global expert in developing, engineering, building and operating Photovoltaic (PV) systems. Enerparc has executed over 3,000 MW of solar projects as an EPC contractor and owns 1960MW of them. With an unrivalled knowledge base, they deliver projects with a high degree of exibility, speed and quality. Enerparc has established local presence in all active solar markets such as Western & Central Europe, Middle East, Australia & India.

Here are the thoughts, Santosh shared with us on how current pandemic has affected solar business in India.

QHow has been the impact of the Covid 19 pandemic in RE sector?

For the last couple of months new enquiries have reduced by 70% for solar project implementation in Indian commercial and Industrial customer base. As cash ow gets tighter among these customers, we expect the projects to move into OPEX or investment-free models where end-customer has someone else putting in the asset and only buys energy. The larger utility market has slowed down, but will resurrect in 4-6 months’ time.

Can we say that the last quarter has been an extraordinarily challenging time for you, as the chief of this enterprise? Where do you see your company go from here? Kindly elaborate

Times like this, is a once in a century event. There is no second thought about moving forward and learning something new from the current situation. I would thus say, one needs to go with what one fundamentally believes in.

We believe in solar and the Indian solar story 100%. Hence, we decided to invest further into our Indian business in April this year right in the middle of the pandemic. My opinion is that the solar market will slow down for next 4-6 months, but will pick up pace and pent up demand ful lled for clean green energy from 4 of this scal year.

QAny SOPs from the Govt so far? If not, what is that you seek from the Government?

For our industry, the SOPS government announced so far are largely aimed at making credit available. In my opinion, this will not by itself lead to industry and economy opening up. Demand needs to open up and credit SOPs have limited impact on this Deregulating distributed decentralised solar generation is one thing the government can think of, to boost the sector. It’s

essential to remove hurdles and allow private enterprise to ourish.

QAny interesting projects OR product development in the pipeline, which one would you like to share with our readers?

In India, we are continuing to build rooftop solar projects for our Industrial customers and we are also building a 37 MW project in Assam. This is one of the largest in that state. We are also investing in Australia and the Netherlands along with Spain and Germany where we continue to build solar projects. We recently completed a 100 MW bifacial solar project in Kazakhstan where temperatures drop to (-) 20 deg in winter and (+) 30 deg in summer. Designing and building this project was a technical challenge.

QWith your years of experience in this allimportant space, your advice/tips to all those following this vibrant sector.

A growing economy like India needs a lot of energy. Being scarce of other options and also to mitigate greenhouse gas emission, India must continue to adopt more and more solar energy. There may be occasional clouds of uncertainty in our industry but I believe the sun will continue to shine strong and long in India. I would wholeheartedly invite those who want to bask in the sunlight to this sector.

QCan you please share some of the key projects implemented by your company?

Enerparc conceived and built South Asia’s rst solar project next to the runway inside Delhi International airport 7 years ago. This 7.5 MW solar project provides close to 25% of the energy requirements of Delhi International airport and taking DGCA and pilots on board to get their green light to build this project was a signi cant rst. We have also built solar systems atop ship-to-shore unloading cranes in JNPT port Mumbai. These are one-of-a-kind solar projects atop cranes that move. In International market, one of the projects I would like to speak about is the one we built only a few meters from the Chernobyl Nuclear power plant site. This solar project which we invested in, is unique among the other 1960 MW of solar assets Enerparc owns across the world. We take pride in greening up the site of the world’s worst nuclear explosion.