Saint-Gobain wants solar manufacturing plant in India

Saint-Gobain is interested in putting up a plant in India but wants government support.

According to the Hindu Business Line, Mr. Fabrice Didier, the Chief Executive Officer of Saint-Gobain Solar and an advisor to the French Government, believes that India can be a preferred source for producing solar equipment – photo voltaic modules, mirrors, ceramics and a range of other components – only if the country gets its policy contours clear.

Mr. Didier, and Mr. B. Santhanam, Managing Director, Saint-Gobain India, said fundamentally, there is an absence of visibility as to how the subsidy regime would be beyond 2013 — the year by which the Government would like to see 1,000 MW of capacity set up, and has announced feed-in tariffs for the generation from that capacity. “There is no visibility on the second phase,” says Mr Santhanam.

Through the National Solar Mission, India wants to develop 20,000 MW of installed solar power capacity. But India has been criticized for its solar policy that it provides heavy subsidy to solar-electricity, but engenders production and job creation elsewhere in the world.

Saint-Gobain is keen on solar energy. The French major is, in-principle, interested in putting up a plant in India, but feels that given the inadequacy of scale, some government support is necessary. The company wants incentives based on output as opposed to a capital subsidy of the kind that was offered in the Semiconductor Policy of 2007.

Mr Santhanam notes that a production unit would not make economic sense unless it is capable of producing 1,000 MW worth of equipment. Saint-Gobain can find overseas markets for about 40 per cent of the capacity, but the other 60 per cent would have to be for India.

Without government support, the manufacturing ecosystem will not develop, he feels.