'Reliance's capex pace in its new energy biz slow'
Reliance Industries' pace of investment in its new energy business seems slow, with cumulative investment at $2 billion so far against a plan of investing $10 billion in the first three years, Kotak Institutional Equities said in a report on Friday. Since it is a new foray and initial learnings need to be made, the pace of capital expenditure (capex) will gradually rise, the report added.
Reliance forayed into new energy business in June 2021 with the launch of wholly-owned subsidiary Reliance New Energy (RNEL).
During FY24, RIL invested ₹8,000 crore in solar energy through RNEL. Out of this, ₹6,900 crore went into Reliance New Solar Energy (RNESL) which «will commence the first train of module and cell manufacturing in FY25,» Kotak said.
RIL had earlier said it would commission the first train of module and cell manufacturing in FY25 based on REC technology.
The company had acquired 100% stake in Norway-headquartered REC Solar for $771 million, or ₹5,800 crore, through RNESL in 2021. This January, however, it sold REC Solar Norway AS to Oslo-listed Elkem ASA for around $22 million. The company aims to scale its solar module capacity to 20 GW in a phased manner by 2026.RIL has set up a 50 MWh (megawatt hour) per year pilot capacity for manufacturing Li battery cells, through Lithium Werks, which it had acquired in March 2022.
«Reliance had earlier indicated its aim to start production of battery packs and scale up to a fully integrated 5 GWh annual cell-to-pack manufacturing facility by 2024, and scale this
