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The Indian wind turbine manufacturers have had an easy time in India unlike their solar manufacturing friends. Companies like Suzlon and Inox have happily got themselves to be a part of a licensing committee which approves every wind turbine that can be used in the Indian wind market. These manufacturers who are part of the council along with industry bodies such as NIWE have made it very hard for foreign wind turbine manufactures to get the license to sell in the burgeoning Indian wind energy market.
The Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) has come out with new rule that say that tubines already meeting international standards will get certification without any additional verification. Bodies such as DNV and IEC are known internationally for giving certificates to wind products and even India follows the same guidelines. With the committee approving wind turbines gone forever, the Indian players have no way to stop international companies from quickly entering the Indian market if they have manufacturing facility in the country.
Wind energy developers are the biggest winners as they will get an increased number of supplies giving them superior products at cheaper prices. Indian players will have to pull up their socks in providing better products to customers. The Indian wind energy industry is anyway changing radically with the introduction of the new subsidy scheme in which fixed Feed in Tariffs (FITs) will go away to be replaced by central reverse auctions. This will lead to reduced prices and costs for the Indian customers, as competition will foster innovation and cost cutting from all supply chain companies operating in the Indian wind energy industry.
An industry source alleged that the committee included a large number of Indian manufacturers who tried to put hurdles in the path of foreign turbine makers trying to enter India. “That’s why it has been done away with,” he said. IWTMA president DV Giri, however, strongly contested the charge. “The notion that local manufacturers were using the committee to hinder international ones is ridiculous and utterly unfounded,” he said. “We have 20 years of technical expertise and were merely using this to ensure reliability and safety of products. But we are ready to see how the online certification method works.”