Power and New and Renewable Energy Minister Piyush Goyal on Tuesday said that the target of generating 175,000 MW of renewable energy by 2022 should be taken up as a mission.He was speaking at the launch of the Indian Renewable Energy Development Agency's (IREDA) loan scheme for rooftop solar power projects, an official statement said.The IREDA scheme will provide loans at interest rates of 9.9 to 10.75 percent to system aggregators and developers of rooftop solar, the new and renewable energy ministry said in the statement."The government of India is soliciting ideas and constructive criticism on all the renewable power projects and no amount of negative response can deter the ministry from its dream of achieving this target," Goyal said addressing a workshop here on "Grid-connected Solar Rooftop".
New and Renewable Energy Secretary Upendra Tripathi said the ministry has funding of Rs.5,000 crore for rooftop that can be made available as interest subvention or 15 percent interest subsidy.The ministry is also trying to get $2 billion from the World Bank and Asian Development Bank, which can be passed on to banks for financing projects on soft rates of interest, he added.Earlier this year, the International Finance Corporation (IFC), the private financing arm of the World Bank, signed an agreement to partner IREDA to provide infrastructure financing for energy projects in India."The partnership will help the IREDA increase its portfolio in financing renewable energy projects to support the government's plans to establish up to 175 GW of renewable energy projects over the next seven years," said IREDA chairman and managing director K.S. Popli.