Back in February 2015, Coal India Limited (CIL) made a simple promise to the Government of India. They would develop 1,000 MW of renewable energy projects by March 2019 and save Rs 55.50 crore every year. Nearly 10 years later, that promise is mostly broken. The story of what went wrong shows India’s struggles with shifting to clean energy.
The original target was ambitious, but things got bigger in 2017. The government gave CIL a new job to develop 3,000 MW of solar power by 2024 and become a Net Zero Energy Company. For a company built on coal mining, this was supposed to be a complete change. CIL would become a leading example of India's renewable energy revolution.
CIL joint ventures came up with NTPC Limited and NLC India Limited, each meant to deliver 1,000 MW of capacity. There was an agreement with Solar Energy Corporation Limited. In April 2021, CIL even created a new subsidiary called CIL Navikarniya Urja Limited to speed up these solar projects. The plan covered everything from ground-mounted solar plants to rooftop installations across 2,67,000 square metres of office buildings, hospitals, workshops, and homes.
On paper, everything looked ready to go. In reality, almost nothing happened.
By November 2021, six years after the original promise, CIL had managed to install just 4.84 MW of solar power. That’s only 0.48 per cent of the initial 1,000 MW target. The breakdown was 2.83 MW of rooftop installations and 2.01 MW of ground-mounted capacity. A Performance Audit Report was clear about it. CIL had failed to take the necessary steps to reach its targets.
Fast forward to December 2024, and things haven’t improved much. The installed capacity across CIL and its seven subsidiaries now stands at 122.492 MW. Against the 3,000 MW target that was supposed to be completed this year, that’s just 4.08 per cent. Work orders had been issued only for 692.50 MW of ground mounted projects and 34.56 MW of rooftop projects till December 2024. These are expected to be ready by 2027 to 2028.
The management blamed COVID-19 and pointed to supply chain problems in photovoltaic solar modules. The Union Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) gave everyone extensions until March 2024, noting that other public sector companies faced similar problems. In February 2023, the management made a new plan. They would hit 11.313 MW by 2022 to 2023, add 397.42 MW in 2023 to 2024, and jump to 1,443 MW in 2024 to 2025, totaling 1,851.733 MW. The remaining capacity would come from land development and projects across India. By July 2023, MNRE said CIL planned to add 1,158 MW of solar capacity by 2025 to 2026, including floating solar installations at abandoned mines and stabilised overburden dumps. However, since then, there has been no update on how these plans are going.
The delays are not just paperwork problems. They are costing the country in ways that add up over time.
The delays aren’t just administrative failures—they’re bleeding the country dry. The original 1,000 MW project promised Rs 55.50 crore in annual savings. Scale that to 3,000 MW, and hundreds of crores vanish each year into opportunity cost. That’s real money that could have funded new infrastructure or strengthened public coffers.
Environmental damage compounds daily. Every megawatt not built means more fossil fuel dependency, more carbon emissions, and a widening gap between India’s climate commitments and reality. This undermines credibility in international forums and makes future promises worthless. Meanwhile, thousands of potential jobs in manufacturing, installation, and maintenance never materialised—economic opportunities lost in regions that desperately need them.
Technology moves faster than CIL’s bureaucracy. Delayed projects will either use outdated equipment at inflated costs or require expensive redesigns. Both options waste money.
The deepest cut is to institutional trust. When a state-backed giant like CIL repeatedly breaks public promises, it poisons confidence in the entire public sector’s capacity to deliver. If CIL can’t execute, why believe any national climate target?
With deadlines pushed to 2027-2028, there’s no margin left. Another delay crosses from disappointing to catastrophic. India’s energy transition needs execution, not endless announcements with revised timelines.
CIL's “Net Zero Energy Company” goal means offsetting its own electricity consumption, not eliminating carbon emissions from coal mining. The plan is straightforward: generate 3,000 MW of solar power to balance the electricity used across mining sites, offices, workshops, hospitals, and residential areas. If solar output matches consumption, the company achieves net zero energy use.
But this remains mostly aspirational. By December 2024, CIL has delivered only 122.492 MW—a mere 4.08 per cent of the target—with most projects pushed to 2027-2028. The government’s 2017 directive aimed to transform CIL from coal-dependent to renewable leader, but the enormous gap between ambition and achievement leaves the actual path to net zero energy deeply uncertain.