The Union Cabinet’s approval of the Rs 1.86 trillion Green Energy Corridor Phase III (GEC-III) scheme on September 30 , 2026 marks a significant shift in how India is preparing its electricity grid for a much larger renewable energy system. The scheme aims to strengthen intra-state transmission systems to evacuate up to 135 gigawatts (GW) of renewable energy and deploy 50 gigawatt hours (GWh) of battery energy storage systems (BESS) by financial year 2032-33 (FY33). The more important question, however, is whether transmission and storage can be built at the pace at which renewable capacity is being added.
Welcoming the Cabinet decision, Simon Stiell, executive secretary of UN Climate Change, described the initiative as “a major step forward that will deliver big dividends for India's people and economy”. He said it will help “harness the country’s growing renewable energy capacity”, strengthen energy security and economic growth, and create jobs across manufacturing, construction and energy storage.
India already had 295.55 GW of installed renewable energy capacity as of August 31, 2026, according to the Union Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE). Solar capacity was 168.04 GW and wind 58.52 GW, while total non-fossil capacity, including nuclear, had reached 304.33 GW. India added 20.87 GW of renewable capacity between April and August 2026 alone.
That makes the timing of GEC-III important. GEC-III focuses on intra-state transmission, strengthening networks within states so that renewable electricity generated within them can be evacuated and consumed more effectively while Phase-I and II were primarily designed around inter-state and inter-regional transmission to enable electricity to move across states and regions and overcome physical limitations in the earlier grid.
The 8,000 MW Raigarh-Pugalur high-voltage direct current corridor, for instance, demonstrated the scale of infrastructure required to move large quantities of electricity between regions, Harikrishna KV, senior policy specialist and head of the Transmission and Grid Planning team at the Centre for Study of Science, Technology and Policy (CSTEP) — a Bengaluru-based think tank, told Down To Earth: “This represents a move towards more granular planning, with the earlier phases having addressed the bigger pieces of the puzzle and the next phase filling in smaller pieces of the network. The approach is relevant to renewable-rich states, including Andhra Pradesh, Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh.”
The government is putting substantial money behind that shift. Of GEC-III’s Rs 1.86 trillion project outlay, Rs 1.36 trillion is earmarked for intra-state transmission and Rs 50,000 crore for 50 GWh of BESS. Central financial support will total Rs 54,082 crore. Greenfield transmission projects will be implemented through tariff-based competitive bidding, while brownfield strengthening and upgrades will follow a cost-plus model. State transmission utilities will be the overall implementing agencies, according to the Cabinet announcement.
But the experience of GEC-I and II shows why the scale of approval cannot be equated with the scale of infrastructure on the ground. GEC-II, approved in January 2022, was designed to add about 10,750 circuit kilometres (ckm) of transmission lines and 27,500 megavolt-amperes (MVA) of substation capacity to evacuate about 20 GW of renewable energy across seven states. The original completion target was by FY26.
The experience of GEC-I and II shows that implementation delays remain a concern, said Binit Das, programme manager, Renewable Energy Programme at the New Delhi-based Centre for Science and Environment (CSE), said, highlighting land acquisition, right-of-way constraints, forest clearances and court cases as factors that can hold up transmission construction. His argument is that transmission projects should be sanctioned only after basic land and clearance requirements are sufficiently ready, with central assistance linked to commissioning milestones.
The problem is acute because generation and transmission do not move at the same speed. Solar projects can be commissioned in roughly 12-18 months, while transmission infrastructure can take 12-24 months or longer, Das pointed. “This creates a structural risk: renewable generation can arrive before the network needs to evacuate it.”
That risk is already visible. According to data from Grid-India cited by the Union Minister of State for Power Shripad Yesso Naik in a written reply to the Lok Sabha on July 29, around 21 GW of variable renewable energy capacity was being evacuated through the Temporary General Network Access mechanism as of July 25. Of this, about 12 GW faced restrictions on evacuation during peak solar generation. Around 6,900 GWh of electricity was restricted from evacuation in 2025-26 because of a mismatch between the commissioning of renewable generation and associated transmission systems. These figures point to a problem that cannot be solved simply by adding more generation capacity.
The question facing India is therefore no longer simply whether enough renewable capacity can be built. It is whether generation, transmission, storage and demand can be brought online in the right locations and at roughly the same time.
This is where GEC-III's BESS component becomes significant. The Cabinet has explicitly envisaged 50 GWh of storage at renewable energy developer or generator sites, or at other locations important for grid flexibility. The government says the storage is intended to address intermittency, congestion, peak-hour curtailment and demand during non-solar hours. It also describes BESS as an integral part of the new scheme.
Harikrishna argued, “Storage should be seen as a complement to transmission rather than a replacement for it. The system needs to find an optimum balance between transmission, storage at different points in the network and distributed generation. Storage can potentially meet incremental demand without requiring equivalent transmission expansion.”
That distinction is important. A battery can shift electricity across hours; it cannot permanently substitute for an inadequate transmission corridor. If a transmission line is congested throughout the day, adding storage may only move the timing of the constraint. But if congestion is concentrated around the solar generation peak and the network has spare capacity at other times, strategically located storage can reduce curtailment and improve utilisation of existing infrastructure.
India's storage market is expanding, but the gap between the pipeline and operational capacity remains substantial. The India Energy Storage Week 2026 market update estimated operational BESS capacity at about 8.5 to 9.3 GWh by mid-2026, while the cumulative tender pipeline had reached 281 GWh. This makes the location of the 50 GWh under GEC-III as important as the headline capacity.
If storage is deployed where congestion actually occurs, it can help defer some network investments, reduce renewable curtailment and shift solar electricity into evening demand. If it is simply allocated alongside generation without adequate system-level planning, its ability to relieve transmission constraints could be much more limited.
Das, therefore, identifies location-based planning and clear revenue mechanisms for BESS as priorities. “The issue is not merely procuring 50 GWh of batteries, but determining where storage has the greatest value to the grid and who pays for the services it provides.”
There is also a lesson in what GEC-III does not do. Harikrishna said, “The third phase should not be interpreted as a mechanism for fixing delays in GEC-I or II. GEC-III is a separate scheme with a different objective.” GEC-I has largely been implemented, while GEC II remains under implementation.
That separation matters because the country's renewable buildout is moving faster than the completion of some network assets. The Central Electricity Authority's transmission plan for integrating more than 900 GW of non-fossil capacity by 2035-36, published in March 2026, shows how much larger the transmission challenge is becoming. The plan is part of the country's broader effort to prepare the grid for rapid growth in non-fossil generation.
The scale of this challenge becomes clearer against India's current renewable trajectory. Between April and August 2026 alone, India added 20.87 GW of renewable capacity, including 17.78 GW of solar and 2.43 GW of wind, according to MNRE's latest physical progress data.
The government's own planning documents recognise that transmission needs to anticipate generation growth. The CEA's transmission plan for integrating more than 500 GW of non-fossil capacity by 2030 was developed precisely because transmission infrastructure has to be planned ahead of the generation it will evacuate.
The implementation problem, however, is not purely technical and not across all states. Delays caused by land acquisition, environmental issues and court cases, including the Great Indian Bustard-related constraints in Rajasthan, Harikrishna pointed, arguing that transmission planning needs to become “more inclusive, bringing transmission and distribution utilities and generators together with private-sector stakeholders and representatives of affected communities."
This assumes significance because the physical grid is only one part of the problem. Transmission lines require land and rights of way, substations require sites and equipment, projects require clearances, and communities affected by towers and corridors need to be brought into the planning process. A transmission scheme can therefore be technically sound on paper and still arrive years after the generation it was supposed to evacuate.