Ratul Puri on Renewable Energy and India’s Energy Transition

India is entering a new phase of its energy transition, shaped by two powerful and interconnected trends: rapidly rising electricity requirements and the growing role of renewable energy.

As manufacturing expands, digital infrastructure grows and electrification spreads across sectors such as transport, electricity is becoming increasingly central to India's economic development. At the same time, the country is adding solar and wind capacity at an unprecedented pace, creating both opportunities and new challenges for the power system.

Ratul Puri, Chairman of Hindustan Power, has argued that India is moving towards an “era of electricity” in which renewable generation will need to be supported by transmission infrastructure, energy storage and smarter grid systems. The underlying idea is straightforward: adding generation capacity is only part of the transition. India must also ensure that electricity can be moved, stored and delivered when and where it is needed.

India’s Changing Power Landscape

India's electricity demand is being driven by a combination of economic growth, industrialisation, urbanisation and increasing electrification. Manufacturing needs dependable power, while data centres and other digital infrastructure are creating new sources of electricity demand. The expanding use of electric vehicles will add another dimension to this changing demand profile.

The International Energy Agency expects India's electricity demand to grow by an average of around 6.4% annually through 2030, with industry, cooling, households, services, agriculture and transport all contributing to the increase.

Renewable energy is becoming an increasingly important part of meeting this demand. According to Ember's Global Electricity Review 2026, solar became India's largest source of clean electricity in 2025, accounting for 9.4% of total electricity generation. Wind and solar together accounted for 14% of India's electricity mix.

These numbers demonstrate the scale of India's renewable energy expansion. But they also highlight a more complex question: how can increasing volumes of variable renewable electricity be integrated into a power system where demand does not always coincide with renewable generation?

Generation Is Only One Part of the Transition

Solar power is strongest during the day, while electricity demand can remain high or rise after sunset. This is becoming particularly important as cooling demand increases. The IEA notes that India's summer peak net load typically occurs around 8 p.m., when solar generation is no longer available.

Wind generation, meanwhile, varies according to weather conditions and location. This means that a power system with a growing share of renewable energy needs greater flexibility to balance fluctuations in both generation and demand.

Transmission infrastructure therefore becomes just as important as generation capacity.

Much of India's renewable generation is being developed in regions with strong solar and wind resources, while major industrial, commercial and urban demand centres may be located elsewhere. Electricity must consequently travel across increasingly long distances, making the expansion and modernisation of transmission networks essential to the country's energy transition.

The Grid Is Becoming a Strategic Priority

The consequences of inadequate transmission capacity are already becoming visible.

An Ember analysis found that India curtailed around 300 GWh of renewable electricity because of transmission constraints during January to March 2026, particularly in the Northern and Western regions. Total renewable energy curtailment during the quarter was estimated at around 470 GWh, with the remainder attributed to system inflexibility.

The episode illustrates a fundamental challenge facing India's energy transition: renewable generation can expand faster than the infrastructure required to evacuate and integrate that electricity.

Ember also found that India had achieved only about 80% of its annual transmission targets over the preceding five years, highlighting the growing need to coordinate generation and transmission planning more closely.

For policymakers and power sector companies, this makes transmission more than an infrastructure requirement. It is becoming a strategic component of India's clean energy transition.

Storage and Smarter Grids

Transmission alone, however, cannot address every challenge.

As the share of solar and wind increases, India will also require greater access to flexible resources that can respond to changes in generation and demand. Battery energy storage systems can help shift renewable electricity from periods of high generation to periods of higher demand, while also providing grid balancing services.

The IEA has highlighted the growing importance of battery storage in meeting India's evening and night-time electricity requirements. Batteries can help reduce peak demand and ease the need for rapid ramping of conventional generation as solar output declines.

This points towards a more integrated model of power system planning, in which renewable generation, transmission, storage and grid management are developed together rather than treated as separate components.

From Renewable Capacity to Reliable Electricity

This is where the broader argument associated with Ratul Puri becomes particularly relevant.

India's energy transition cannot be measured simply by the number of gigawatts of renewable capacity installed. The more meaningful measure is how effectively that capacity can contribute to reliable electricity supply.

The next phase of the transition will therefore require a combination of continued renewable energy deployment, stronger transmission networks, energy storage and increasingly sophisticated grid management systems.

India has already demonstrated that it can rapidly scale renewable generation. The challenge now is to build the wider electricity system around that growth.

As electricity becomes increasingly central to India's economic development, the country's energy future will depend not only on generating more clean power, but on creating the infrastructure needed to move, store and deliver it reliably.

That is likely to be one of the defining challenges and opportunities of India's transition towards a more electrified and increasingly renewable energy system.

About Ratul Puri

Ratul Puri is the Chairman of Hindustan Power, an integrated power generation company with a strong presence in renewable and transitional energy generation. Over the years, Ratul Puri has been involved in the development of large-scale energy infrastructure projects that support India’s growing power requirements and its transition toward cleaner energy sources.

About Hindustan Power

Hindustan Power is an integrated power generation company with a presence across renewable and transitional energy assets. The company continues to invest in energy infrastructure that supports reliability, sustainability and long-term value creation within India’s evolving power sector.