Billionaire Gautam Adani’s group is planning to build 10 GW of integrated solar manufacturing capacity by 2027, as it looks to capture the energy transition business, sources close to the company said. The Adani group currently has a solar manufacturing capacity of 4 GW.

Adani Solar has a confirmed order book of over 3,000 MW in exports that are to be serviced over the next 15 months, they said, adding Adani, recently, raised $394 million for solar manufacturing from Barclays PLC and Deutsche Banks AG through a trade finance facility.

While India scaled up its solar energy generation from 2.63 GW in March 2014 to 71.10 GW in July 2023, the manufacturing ecosystem did not match the pace.

To change, the government adopted a two-pronged strategy — used trade and non-trade barriers such as safeguard duty, an approved list of module manufacturers (ALMM), and a production-linked incentive (PLI) scheme.

This gave Indian solar manufacturing the necessary impetus to encourage private players such as the Adani group to scale up investments in the solar manufacturing sector.

After the success of Adani Green Energy (AGEL) — the group’s listed renewable energy generation entity, Adani Enterprises (AEL) made strides in lining up and incubating solar PV manufacturing with Adani Solar in 2015.

Adani Solar commenced manufacturing in 2016, with a 1.2 GW cell and module manufacturing capacity.