By Nidhi Verma and Sethuraman N R
NEW DELHI/BENGALURU (Reuters) – Indian conglomerate Reliance Industries is ready for its next stage of growth and aims to become the largest developer of renewable energy projects in the country, the company said in its annual report issued on Wednesday.
“Reliance has consolidated its balance sheet after the previous round of capex and is ready for the next level of growth,” Chairman Mukesh Ambani said in the report.
The company continues to monitor financial markets to seize suitable opportunities for capital-raising to support its growth plans, it said.
The oil-to-telecoms conglomerate, which operate the world’s biggest refining complex at Jamnagar in western Gujarat state, in 2021 announced $10 billion of investments to develop its green energy portfolio and achieve its 2035 net zero carbon goal.
Another Indian conglomerate, Adani Group, is also investing billions of dollars to expand its green energy offerings and aims to boost non-fossil fuel capacity, including solar and wind, to 500 gigawatts (GW) by 2030.
Reliance, which seeks to establish 100 GW of renewable energy (RE) installations by 2030, will start production of ingots and wafers – used to make low-cost solar cells and modules – at its 10 GW solar photovoltaic (PV) giga factory in Jamnagar by December.
The company aims to double the capacity of the PV factory by 2026.
“Over the next 12 months, our focus is to bring new energy manufacturing facilities on-stream, operate them efficiently, and start developing RE generation projects,” Reliance said, adding it wants to develop a local supply chain to cut imports.
Reliance said it would partner with global players to obtain technologies in the new energy space for building end-to-end integrated renewable energy manufacturing facilities, including projects for green hydrogen, green chemicals and energy storage.
(Reporting by Nidhi Verma; Editing by David Holmes)
