It is the birthplace of Mahatma Gandhi; an arid province where the Indian independence leader led a famous march against British imperial rule.
Now two British-listed companies are planning to colonise Gujarat once again, this time with hundreds of wind turbines, as part of an ambitious plan to turn the state into India’s biggest centre for green energy production.
Vikram Kailas, managing director of Mytrah Energy, says the AIM-listed company is planning to install 700 turbines across India over the next two years, making it the country’s biggest wind generator. “Wind power in India is now cheaper to produce than coal-fired power and there is huge pent-up demand for electricity,” said the former Credit Suisse banker. Mytrah plans to invest $1 billion (£600 million) per year in new projects in India, he said.
That includes the huge Chotila scheme in Gujarat where, on a brown hillside, dozens of huge turbines spin gently. As India’s windiest state, Gujarat has the potential to generate 11,000 megawatts of wind energy — equivalent to nearly three times the output of Drax, Britain’s biggest coal-fired power station.
With the state government offering wind farm investors a tempting package of cheap land, guaranteed tariffs and a quick approval time of just six months — compared with several years in Britain — turbines generating over 2,000MW have already been installed in Gujarat by Mytrah and other companies including Greenko, another London-listed business. That is equivalent to one third of all the wind turbines installed in Britain. This is just the start, though, of an aggressive expansion in the state that could transform the semi-desert area around the Gulf of Kutch into one of the world’s biggest wind power sites.
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India needs 12 per cent more electricity than it can currently generate, leading to frequent blackouts for consumers. This, combined with its low production costs have made wind energy a much more attractive financial proposition than in Europe.
Erecting a 1MW turbine in India costs $1.1 million, about half what it costs in Britain. It also compares favourably with coal and gas-fired power stations.
“The cost of coal has nearly quadrupled in the past four years and that has completely changed the economics,” said Mr Kailas. “Suddenly the grid is saying: ‘hello, this is the cheapest form of power in India’.”
He claims wind power in Gujarat can cost as little as two rupees (2½ pence) per kilowatt hour. Generating electricity from imported Indonesian coal costs two or three times as much.
India plans to generate 20 per cent of its electricity from renewables by 2020, an ambition that will require 20 gigawatts of turbines to be installed. With the country now erecting more turbines than anywhere else in the world, apart from the US and China, it looks like a target that will be met.