Venue: India Expo Centre, Greater Noida

This exhibition was held to generate further awareness regarding renewable energy. It also provided valuable business opportunities for representatives of various stakeholders to network and exchange ideas. This write-up will explore the major business innovations that were witnessed that can have major impact on society if and once scaled for more to use.

Major Participants

The major participants came from different segments of the industry. There were parts manufacturers, suppliers, grid developers, media, business consulting firms and researchers. The maximum participants were from India, China, Taiwan or South Korea. It seems these are the most progressive countries within the renewable energy space.

Following were some of the major companies represented:

·         Adani

·         Huawei

·         Trina Solar

·         Su Kam

·         Bloomberg

·         Suzlon

·         GCL

·         Phocos

·         Vikram Solar

·         Seraphim

·         IREDA

·         Solar Today

·         Harsha Abakus Solar

·         Bergen

·         Waaree

·         Sino Tech

·         Tale Sun

·         Solis

·         Power Today

Major Learnings

Some major points were imbibed during this event. They have been explained company – wise.

Sino Tech

This company has created an innovation by which ground water can be extracted using solar power. Extensive market research was conducted by the organization to understand the real challenges in the Indian rural landscape. It was realized that ground water is prevalent in large parts of the country but there were little or no means to extract the same. Thus these places remain parched or heavily dependent on unpredictable seasonal rains in spite of a latent source actually being available. So, Sino Tech embarked on this project where abundant solar power is leveraged to pull out water from the recesses below ground level. As yet, the technology is somewhat expensive so has not been implemented in large areas, but once the funding arrives for mass production and scale, the venture will take off.

Phocos

While grid based electricity provision is on the rise across the world, it is still elusive in rural areas especially in emerging markets. For such places where the grid cannot reach, Phocos has developed an off-grid network by which cells may be charged using company products so avoid having to be part of the grid. Charging of such devices is often a challenge and thus the solution was developed at the Ulm University in Germany from where this off-grid technology originates.

Waaree

Waaree has designed a technology by which giving credence to some of the missions of the present government, solar panels can be laid on the national highways. The central government feels that since renewable energy is amongst the most important targets and land is available on the highways, they must be utilized. In a normal day, very few cars or vehicles pass over them and during that time, these automatically get shut off. The conversion efficiency stands quite low on these devices as of now but improvements are being sought and till then some progress can be made by using existing infrastructure.

Criticism

One criticism that must be leveled is the fact that by and large only solar energy was paid attention at during this expo. There was hardly any presence for the other giant- wind energy. And there weren’t many for other sustainable means such as jatropha, gobar gas, geothermal, biomass etc. While solar is obviously the largest of the sub-segments, the others also hold substantial presence and potential to be tracked about.

Conclusion

Overall this was a very important summit cum exhibition. The newest technologies were on view. The event also highlighted how eastern Asian countries are stealing a march ahead by being major representatives during these few days.