Indian wind power gets Japanese boost

INDIA: Japanese financial services firm Orix is set to invest in 229MW of new wind projects in India across seven states.

by Martin Foster 18 March 2016

ILFS owns over 1GW of renewable energy capacity in India

Orix, a Tokyo-based financial group, in conjunction with Mumbai-based Infrastructure Leasing & Financial Service (ILFS), will build 26 projects.

As of July 2015, Orix held a 23.54% stake in ILFS. Orix has also invested 49% of the equity required for ILFS's wind portfolio. 

The Japanese firm is to set to make a further investment from September 2016 once the planned projects are online, but an Orix spokesperson declined to reveal the total investment amount.

ILFS owns approximately 775MW of wind power already online, and when the new projects are complete its portfolio will exceed 1GW.

The 26 new projects stretch across the Indian states of Tamil Nadu, Rajasthan, Gujarat, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Madhya Pradesh, according to the Orix spokesperson.

A mixture of turbines will be used at the projects, including 800kW machines from Enercon manufactured by World Wind India under licence from the German manufacturer, plus originally developed machines from the Indian company, the spokesperson added.

Power will be sold mainly to state power companies under feed-in tariff arrangements and to commercial-scale utilities.