Wind energy contributes 60 gigawatts (GW) to India’s target of achieving 175 GW of renewable energy by 2022. However, in the last few years, the sector has witnessed an immense slowdown. The annual capacity addition of wind energy was below 2 GW for the last two consecutive years—a drastic 60 per cent decrease from the financial year 2016–17.2 Frequent policy changes, infrastructural unpreparedness, and a lack of consensus among stakeholders have crippled the growth of the sector, thereby jeopardising the possibility of achieving national targets in time. In order to revitalise the sector and achieve the 60 GW target by 2022, this study examines the wind energy sector—its evolution over three decades and current challenges—and develops three scenarios that illustrate different pathways to achieve the minimum capacity required to reach 60 GW goal by 2022.
