Small renewable energy projects installed by consumers are set to get a boost as the government has modified the proposed growth trajectory of renewable energy purchase obligations for distribution companies and open access consumers, and made it more stringent. The government has introduced a new segment called ‘distributed renewable energy’. Renewable energy projects with capacity of less than 10 megawatt (MW) installed by consumers under any arrangement – net metering, gross metering, virtual net metering, group net metering, behind the meter installations and any other configuration – will qualify for renewable purchase obligation from the distributed renewable energy segment. This update to the trajectory of renewable purchase obligations is significant because the obligations have been issued under the Energy Conservation Act, meaning that non-compliance will attract hefty penalties and state regulators may not have a role to play in them. The Bureau of Energy Efficiency (BEE), under the power ministry, will maintain data related to compliance of renewable energy utilisation by the designated consumers and submit reports to the Centre. Gaurav Upadhyay, energy finance specialist (South Asia) at Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA), believes that this push will kickstart sectors where competitiveness in terms of pricing was previously lacking. The purchase obligation for new wind energy projects stands at 0.67% of total energy used for FY25 and 3.48% for FY30.