Washington, DC (November 18)—India is revising its solar power generation target to 100,000 megawatts for 2022, five times greater than India’s current solar generation, according to remarks by made by Power and Renewable Energy minister Piyush Goyal on Monday. Goyals’ remarks came at a time when at the Prime Minister Narendra Modi called for enhanced collaboration on clean energy research and development during the G20 Summit in Brisbane, Australia.

Following is a statement by Manish Bapna, Executive Vice President and Managing Director, World Resources Institute:

“India's proposal will benefit its citizens by exponentially increasing the delivery of more low-cost, low-carbon energy in the power sector. India’s commitment is particularly impressive considering it is a lower middle-income country with over half of its population living on less than $2 per day.

“Thanks to plummeting prices and domestic energy policies, solar energy may soon be the cheapest form of electricity for Indian customers. But whether India can reach this ambitious goal depends on mobilizing finance at scale for leapfrogging technologies. This is yet another example of how important finance is to decarbonizing the world's energy mix.”