Jawaharlal Nehru National Solar Mission (JNNSM)

ABOUT JNNSM (Jawaharlal Nehru National Solar Mission)

⇒ JNNSM stands for Jawaharlal Nehru National Solar Mission.

⇒ The JNNSM (also known as the National Solar Mission) is a major initiative of the Government of India and State Governments to promote ecologically sustainable growth while addressing India’s energy security challenges.

⇒ It will also constitute a major contribution by India to the global effort to meet the challenges of climate change. Named for Jawaharlal Nehru, the Mission is one of the several initiatives that are part of National Action Plan on Climate Change.

GOALS
⇒ Establish India as a global leader in solar energy

⇒ To focus on setting up an enabling environment for solar technology penetration in the country both at a centralized and decentralized level.

⇒ The entire program is divided into phases.

⇒ The period of the 11th Plan and first year of the 12th Plan (up to 2012-13) will be Phase 1, the remaining 4 years of the 12th Plan (2013-17) will be Phase 2 and the 13th Plan (2017-22) as Phase 3.

⇒ The first phase (up to 2013) focused on capturing of the low hanging options in solar; on promoting off-grid systems to serve populations without access to commercial energy and modest capacity addition in gridbased systems. In the second phase, after taking into account the experience of the initial years, capacity will be aggressively ramped up to create conditions for up scaled and competitive solar energy penetration in the country.

⇒ In the second phase, after taking into account the experience of the initial years, capacity will be aggressively ramped up to create conditions for up scaled and competitive solar energy penetration in the country.

⇒ Utility Grid Power including rooftop capacity addition target are as follows: 1100 MW (Phase 1), 10,000 MW(Phase 2) & 20,000 MW (Phase 3).

VIEWS OF WORLD BANK REGARDING JNNSM & INDIA
⇒ It is poised to make India a global leader in solar power as the program JNNSM in its first phase has increased the installed capacity from 30 MW to more than 2,000 MW.

⇒ JNNSM has been instrumental in bringing down the cost of the solar power.

⇒ In fact, JNNSM has made India the lowest cost destinations for gridconnected solar Photovoltaic (PV) in the world

⇒ Solar power can reduce India’s dependence on imports of diesel and coal for power generation, cut greenhouse gas emissions and contribute to energy security.

⇒ Growth in this sector will help India increase its share of clean energy and meet its target of reducing emissions per unit of its GDP by 20-25 per cent by 2020 over the 2005 levels.

⇒ Building on the success of Phase 1, the programme now needs to focus on promoting financing of solar projects by commercial banks, developing shared infrastructure facilities such as solar parks and identifying comparative advantage of Indian manufacturing across the supply chain.