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EQ in conversation with Mr. Saurabh Bhandari – Founder & C.E.O. at SolarMaxx

EQ in conversation with Mr. Saurabh Bhandari – Founder & C.E.O. at SolarMaxx

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1.    Solar Trade Wars:  What is Your View?

The safeguard duty on solar cells and modules is proving to be a bigger issue for local manufacturers than was anticipated considering there are only a handful Indian cell manufacturers. The present scenario is resulting in the industry not being lucrative or supportive to small scale manufacturers or new entrants.

To have a safeguard duty is good for the long run but to implement it altogether on raw material and finished product at the same time has slowed down a growing sector. It is fair enough to have high tariffs on finished solar modules but the local cell manufacturing market needs to grow manifold before such regulations so that the overall sectors growth does not get affected.

Meanwhile, the government does not want to pay more to procure power and has cancelled multiple auctions citing high tariffs, which was due to the safeguard duty that they imposed. It seems that we will continue to see a tug of war and the uncertainty that comes with it for the foreseeable future.

India is somewhere having conflicting desires to procure cheap solar equipment on one side and to encourage domestic manufacturing base through imposition of import duties. The latter means slower capacity additions and higher tariffs in the short run. Two years is inadequate to create a robust manufacturing base to compete globally, such measures can only be successful once we already have a large existing cell manufacturers base. A consistent long-term solar policy is the need of the hour.

2.    RoofTopSolar: Whats the future and your role

India’s dependence on thermal power will take time to dilute till most home owners choose to power their rooftop spaces with solar and the grid connections to the rural areas get extended and powered with solar projects.

With lack of space, new utility scale power plants will gradually fade and the market will be dominated for the manufacturers providing services for rooftop projects because they need no additional land space. Further with rooftop solar the site of power generation and consumption is the same hence saving on network losses or additional expenditures required for development and modernization of the present power grids.

Turnkey Rooftop Solar power projects is our area of foray at SolarMaxx and we are committed to help the nation meet its targets of 40GW by 2022.

At SolarMaxx we have covered many housing societies along with independent domestic projects across north India. The new generation is finding ways to protect the environment and “Go Green”. If the living place is such that it helps in reducing carbon footprint and also save money it acts as an added advantage for people.

Several known brands and industries have covered their sheds/roofs into a power house with SolarMaxx. Be it our projects at listed companies such as Saboo Sodium Chloro Ltd. at Nava or NBC Ltd. Jaipur or at garment and handicraft manufacturers such as J C Home Tex, Sitapura, Usha Precision at Macheda or Vogue Exports at Bindakaya, every single project be it small or big helps save money and avail tax benefits to the companies and savings to the individuals. Where the huge sheds of industries are normally left unutilised, they are now being used as a solar power house generating electricity and bringing savings in various forms to the enterprise.

As a module manufacturer, we are aggressively looking at supplying our modules to EPC companies for rooftop installations. At the same time we are actively looking at expanding our EPC vertical across India with a strong focus on rooftop installations. SolarMaxx Turnkey Solar Power solutions is the way forward for our domestic as well as institutional and industrial rooftop segments.

3.    Whats your commitment towards the solar sector in India

Commitments are important in every business, even in solar energy sector, as the decision to buy solar panels, is an important financial decision for most of the people. SolarMaxx solar panel prices are very affordable and can easily be purchased by the families and by commercial user alike. We are providing SolarMaxx solar panels at affordable and comprehensive prices across India and this will only help in building up the sector as a whole when quality is available at affordable prices.

India is working to meet its 100GW solar power target by 2022 as part of its global climate change commitments. We at SolarMaxx as a turnkey solar power solutions provider with inhouse manufacturing, R&D facility are hopeful that we will all together as an industry exceed the targets given the competitive and ever-growing market for solar, no matter what challenges come our way.

We at SolarMaxx partner with several community and religious institutions and offer them our best possible pricing for their solar rooftop projects to support a good cause because when such public locations turn solar, they help spread a word amongst people to switch to an environment friendly path too. There was a time when environmentalists would seek the involvement of religious institutions to spread the green message, considering that they attract a large number of devotees. They often proposed that pilgrims could plant trees. Now a days such institutions and individuals have adopted alternate energy which will in-turn make a larger impact on the society considering the large number of followers that visit religious monuments and pilgrims.

4.    Message for the readers on World Environment Day

It is not in the hands of the governments alone to act on climate crisis. This politics needs a transformation – a mass movement and an action from people to solve the climatic crisis is the only way out. Encouraging environment friendly practices in each and every sphere of our life, saying no to plastics, reducing waste and going minimalistic is the call of the hour. Making the right choices in our everyday life decisions can take us all a long way in saving our planet.

As the World Environment day approaches, we at SolarMaxx would like to urge all the readers here to spread a word around and encourage Green Living practices for a better tomorrow.

Increasing energy efficiency by using cleaner renewable sources of energy such as solar or wind, as individuals we can contribute in a big way.

By far Solar Power seems to be the best solution against conventional energy to fight the carbon emissions at all levels. A 1 MW solar power plant can cut down carbon emissions by about 1000 tonnes per annum, this is almost like planting 5000 trees annually. Of course, trees have the added advantage of producing oxygen as well but the need for power gets solved with this clean form of energy.

A one-time investment in solar yields benefits for over 2 decades and saves the depleting resources for the future generations. Solar as a technology is becoming extremely cost effective, under economies of scale, and is capable of reducing our dependency on expensive fuel and gas, thus, acting as a peacemaker for the end users.

The environmental awareness that’s created through the Environment Day is important in helping the world move towards better ecological practices. So, make solar on your top priority list and celebrate the World Environment Day with Solar Energy. Whether you are going solar for savings or environmental reasons, the result is the same – you are helping yourselves and the planet earth.

5.    Kindly highlight your strengths and USP which gives your company a distinct advantage as compared to your competitors.

We focus on sourcing of extremely high-quality raw material from some of the most renowned brands globally.

SolarMaxx Solar PV Modules are TUV certified by a globally recognized agency. Our modules have gone through a series of stringent tests to receive the necessary IEC certifications. For the satisfaction of Indian consumers, we have also got our modules tested at the MNRE approved test centre in India. Besides getting and renewing these certifications on a regular basis, we stringently control each stage of our manufacturing process to prevent the production of a sub-standard or low-quality module.

We are increasingly looking at automation in our production processes to avoid human intervention as much as possible in the entire production process. This has definitely led to increased “quality” output of modules.

Being a local manufacturer and service provider always gives us an added advantage for the trust we have acquired of a decade of working in the Solar Energy sector in Rajasthan and its neighbouring states.

6.    Kindly enlighten our readers on the performance of your modules in India in various geographic locations

Quality, performance, and durability of the solar panels is the prime concern of our users. With a trust of over a decade in the field of solar energy, SolarMaxx has secured a strong ground in Rajasthan’s Solar market.

“We have used SolarMaxx solar system and found it efficient, they give very satisfactory after sales service.” says Mr. K H Shah, Chairman of Rajesh Motors.

As a solar PV module manufacturer producing high-efficiency mono and polycrystalline PV modules in our production facility at Jaipur we deliver modules as per the customers geographic location. Polycrystalline PV modules offer a better temperature coefficient for higher temperature regions and hence we focus more on poly panels for the hotter climate areas of North Western India around Rajasthan and Haryana.

Anand Gupta Editor - EQ Int'l Media Network

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