State Rooftop Solar Attractiveness Index – SARAL is an initiative of the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) and its partners to introduce a measuring scale or an index to evaluate and rank all states according to their performance, growth, level of maturity, policy framework, and implementation environment in the rooftop solar sector.
With the renewable energy market becoming increasingly relevant to the Indian power and utilities sector, the renewable energy segment as a whole (and rooftop solar as a sub-segment) is witnessing substantial interests from entrepreneurs, developers, potential investors, end users and government entities. Government of India (GoI) is striving to support the rapid scale up of renewable products through several initiatives such as policy advocacy, financial assistance schemes and regulatory interventions. At the same time, various states have also adopted state-level guidelines with the aim of creating a conducive ecosystem for rooftop solar installation. Based on states’ stakeholders’ readiness, availability of natural resources and state governments’ approach towards rooftop solar, the proliferation has been non-uniform across the states, creating an avenue for experience sharing and knowledge exchange for the states. At this stage of the sector, it is, therefore, imperative for the states to exchange knowledge and learn from each other in the journey to achieve the country’s ambitious target of 40 GW rooftop solar installations by 2022.
With this background, the idea of introducing a platform for knowledge-sharing and inducing healthy competition in rooftop solar segment among Indian states was envisioned. This platform could depict the most attractive states, best practices, positive developments, while highlighting the key improvement areas across policy development and implementation, consumer involvement, and investment ecosystem.
The aim of SARAL index is to evaluate Indian states based on their preparedeness to support rooftop solar deployment. The index aims to objectively assess states based on several parameters critical for establishing strong solar rooftop markets. These parameters belong to five broad categories:
The index serves as an important tool to:
The index can accrue multiple benefits to stakeholders such as:
Central and state governments can use SARAL to
Institutional investors can use SARAL to
Businesses can use SARAL to
To comprehensively and realistically assess the performance of rooftop solar sector in all states, five broad buckets have been identified after extensive stakeholder consultation. These buckets are:
There are multiple parameters and sub-parameters to quantify those five buckets, for which data points are captured through primary and secondary researches and subsequently mapped to a numeric scale. Finally, each score is scaled based on the assigned weightages and an aggregate score is computed.
Based on the states’ scores, grades are assigned on the following scales: A++, A+, A, B++.
Parameters | Weightage | Sub-parameters | Weightage | Descirption | Weightage |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Robustness of policy framework | 20% | Level of policy support | 33.3% | Clarity and detailing in metering regulation | 25.0% |
Availability of other state schemes to promote solar rooftop | 25.0% | ||||
Provision of single woindow mechanism | 25.0% | ||||
Provision of deemed approval process | 25.0% | ||||
Convenants | 33.3% | Minimum GRPV system size allowed in the state | 33.3% | ||
Maximum GRPV system size allowed in the state | 33.3% | ||||
Cumulative capacity of solar vis-à-vis regional DT capacity | 33.3% | ||||
Billing Mechanism | 33.3% | Permissible settlement time | 100.0% | ||
Effectiveness of policy support/ implementation | 26.3% | Ease of application | 60.0% | Presence of interactive consumer interfaces | 33.3% |
Average time taken from date of application to system installation | 33.3% | ||||
Ease of availing state subsidies | 33.3% | ||||
Power offtake attractiveness | 10.0% | Deviation from the stipulated settlement period | 100.0% | ||
State of affairs of discoms | 20.0% | Credit rating of Discoms | 100.0% | ||
Impact of policy | 10.0% | Instances of retrospective changes to the policy | 50.0% | ||
The rooftop target achieved so far (in %) | 50.0% | ||||
Investment climate | 16.8% | Driver for rooftop solar uptake | 33.33% | Share of C&I consumers in total GRPV installation | 100.0% |
Ease of financing | 33.33% | Ease of securing loans | 50.0% | ||
Availability of insurance providers for GRPV projects | 50.0% | ||||
Maturity of market | 33.33% | Availability of project developers/installers/ material suppliers | 100.0% | ||
Consumer experience | 26.3% | Pre-installation consideration | 30.0% | Consumer awareness | 43.0% |
Tariff rise for end consumers | 43.0% | ||||
System Average Interruption Duration Index | 8.0% | ||||
System Average Interruption Frequency Index | 8.0% | ||||
During installation | 40.0% | Ease of execution - from application to installation | 100.0% | ||
Post-installation experience/costs | 30.0% | O&M cost | 50.0% | ||
Warranty and aftersales experience | 50.0% | ||||
Business ecosystem | 10.6% | Business enablers | 37.5% | Ease of doing business index | 33.3% |
NCAER economy rating of the state | 33.3% | ||||
MSME 5 year growth rate | 33.3% | ||||
Fiscal and Regulatory environment | 37.5% | Credit rating of the state | 33.3% | ||
Transparency in policy making | 33.3% | ||||
Insitutional architecture | 33.3% | ||||
Economic Outlook | 25.0% | GSDP per captia | 50.0% | ||
GSDP growth | 50.0% |
The states which have scored A++ for the financial year 2018-19 are as follows.
To access the complete SARAL report, click here.
Last Modified : 8/21/2023
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