India ranks 3rd in ‘Renewable Energy Country Attractiveness Index’

India has moved up a spot to third position on EY’s Renewable Energy Country Attractiveness Index owing to an exceptional performance on the solar photovoltaic (PV) front. US and China are in the first and the second spot, respectively.

According to the report released on Wednesday, India’s solar sector is likely to grow substantially post the COVID-19 pandemic, with generation from solar PV forecast to outdo coal before 2040, EY said in a statement.

The drastic change has been led by the government’s policy ambitions, which have led solar PV to be the most cost-competitive source of power in the region and improve further with the passage of time, it added. The observations are as per the 57th EY Renewable Energy Country Attractiveness Index (RECAI) released by EY globally.

In 2020, global renewable energy capacity investments grew 2 per cent to $303.5 billion, the second-highest annual figure recorded to date despite the impact of the pandemic, EY said.

However, the EY RECAI 57 estimated that future development to achieve net zero will require a further investment of $5.2 trillion and highlighted the role of institutional investors in financing the energy transition.

The RECAI 57 found that environment, sustainability and governance (ESG) goals are increasingly being prioritised on the investor agenda while institutional investors’ interest in renewables continues to grow.