There are 2,391 rooftop solar installations on government buildings in the State with a capacity of 24.25 MW, as on June 2024.
| Photo Credit: File Photo
As on June 2024, there are 2,391 rooftop solar installations on government buildings in Karnataka with a capacity of 24.25 megawatts (MW). While the highest number of such installations — 1,354 — are found in Chamundeshwari Electricity Supply Company (CESC) limits, there are only 187 installations in Bangalore Electricity Supply Company (Bescom) jurisdiction.
While rooftop solar panels were installed in 1,200 buildings under the 13th Finance Commission Funds, 1,191 of them were installed under the Integrated Power Development Scheme (IPDS).
Despite Bengaluru, the State capital, having a greater number of government organisations, there have been only 187 installations with a capacity of 8.71 MW.
Out of these, 132 have been installed with the funds from the 13th Finance Commission. Under that, the power utility commissioned rooftop solar installations in five government buildings in 2020–21, 38 buildings in 2021–22, 68 buildings in 2022–23, and 21 buildings in 2023–24.
However, senior officials said Bescom is now in the process of achieving 100% saturation of government buildings with rooftop solar panels.
“According to the data collected by Operations and Maintenance zones of Bescom, there are 40,380 government offices with a cumulative capacity of 452.73 MW. We submitted an action plan to the Energy Department in February this year. Considering the fact that there may be more than one government office in a building, it is estimated that there is scope for around 25,000 rooftop installations,” Mahantesh Bilagi, Managing Director, Bescom, told The Hindu.
He said that an expression of interest had been called to provide the costing details for carrying out a feasibility study.
Besides this, there have been 573 rooftop solar installations in Hubballi Electricity Supply Company limits, 165 installations in Gulbarga Electricity Supply Company limits, and 112 installations in Mangaluru Electricity Supply Company limits.
Domestic installations
Ever since the introduction of the Gruha Jyothi scheme, the demand for rooftop solar installations has come down among domestic consumers. In 2024, there are roughly 7,000 domestic consumers in Bescom limits who have installed rooftop solar panels.
With Bengaluru having a rooftop solar potential of up to 2,800 MW, Bescom is now looking at getting consumers who are not benefiting from Gruha Jyothi to go for rooftop installations.
