印度电力需求激增，AI数据中心成新增长点

What if I told you that every few years India's power demand grows by the equivalent of an entire European country? And that's only the beginning. Over the next five years, India is expected to add as much electricity demand as Germany consumes in an entire year. And then comes the next big customer. Artificial intelligence. Electricity demand from data centers is expected to increase at least tenfold by 2030. My guest today are Praveer Sinha the CEO and managing director of Tata Power, India's largest private sector electricity company.

Already, nearly 40 gigawatt to 50 gigawatt of solar power is not being scheduled. Uh, we need to come out of that curtailment mainstream and have 100% because after all, you are generating power. It's pure money which is being wasted, pure energy which is being wasted. And Mohit Bhargava, country director at the India Energy and Climate Center at the Goldman School of Public Policy at UC Berkeley. Mohit previously led the green energy arm of NTPC, which is India's largest state owned power company.

We need to look at or focus on technologies or sources which are inherently are within our control. So a lot of it will happen when we start decarbonizing the industry. Okay. The big chunk will happen with the I. So here is the question. Can India's power system keep up with the needs of not just households and industry, but the energy demands of the AI economy? I'm Menaka Doshi. Welcome to Emerging, where we dive deep into how the world's most exciting rising economies are shaping the global future.

Praveer, Mohit, welcome to Emerging. I want to start by asking you about what a crazy summer this has been Praveer. Uh, you know, what did it take to make sure that India kept running through this incredible intensity of heat waves? Uh, such a pleasure to come and talk to you about India's power sector. Uh, as you rightly mentioned, that the capacity in India has been growing at a very fast pace. And just to give you some data points, uh, turn of the century, uh, 2000, we have a just 100 gigawatt. 2010 we were something like 200 plus.

And now in 2026, we are at 530 gigawatt. So that's the type of capacity addition that is happening. And the capacity addition is happening because of three reasons. One is that the aspirational India wants to grow and more and more people use electrical equipments and have more electrical gadgets. The second is the the climate change which is happening. And you mentioned about this summer being, uh, uh, extreme heatwaves, temperatures, uh, going up to 50 degrees in many places.

And, uh, we are expecting that, uh, the, uh, especially the air conditioning and cooling load will increase over the next 20, 25 years. So India's power growth is something which we see consistently going up, and we expect this to increase now that a lot of data centers and ice centers are coming up and a lot of other, uh, related commercial activity, industrial activity. So I think it's a good issue for India. Uh, Indian industry has done exceedingly well.

Uh, India has added capacity. And I do feel that, uh, the India's power sector, and especially the private sector in India will continue to contribute to a very large extent. Praveer, are you saying that this summer was a breeze? Yeah. Absolutely not. At no point did you feel like. Because it's like you said, whilst temperatures may be, uh, something India is familiar with at 48 degrees or 50°C, uh, the air conditioning demand has been climbing quite rapidly over the last few years.

Right. So did you feel that there was any point in the summer where, uh, it was touch and go, uh, that, you know, we could be facing very large blackouts? Uh, I don't think so. We have enough, uh, reserve capacity with us. And while, you know, for one day it went to two 71 gigawatt has been in the range of about 250 to 260. And, uh, we have been able to cater to that requirement. So it's not that, uh, uh, we are absolutely hand-to-mouth.

Uh, we have huge capacity ads that have happened in the last few years, uh, daytime, if in fact, we have so much of excess energy many times during the day, the power cost goes down to ₹1. In fact, in some hours it has gone to zero. So I don't think, uh, India is today starved of power. And the way the capacity ads are happening now. Last year we added 55GW. So it's a huge capacity ad that has taken place. Uh, we will be able to cater to the growing need.

Uh, of course, uh, we need to do the balancing of the generation. Uh, right now, most of it is renewable. But how do you make it from battery storage? Pumped storage? Some of those actions needs to be taken, but I think we are ready to meet the future challenges. That's not something you could have set off to India's power sector, maybe, you know, 15 years ago or 20 years ago, but we've come a long way whilst relying on coal.

But I think I want to add one simple point what big demand discussion is happening? You see, the fact is we are very focused on the peak number, which incidentally happens during the daytime. It happened at about 3:30 p.m. the afternoon, and I think 2 or 3 times at around 233, we have had 268 to 70 kind of number. The problem which probably probability may accept is the evening. During the daytime we have almost 100GW of solar coming out of the system, which, as you rightly said, enables surplus power in the daytime.

But if we are hitting two 50GW in the evening when the sun is down and wind is very intermittent, we get it only a few months in a year. Then we are actually heavily breathing, because then the entire load has to be met from all the so-called conventional or delegated systems, as you said, coal, hydro, nuclear, whatever there is. And in some cases, what we know is that we have also used gas to meet that requirement. So the larger challenge and and that is something we tend to miss quite often, is the fact that is not the peak demand number during the day, which matters.

It's the peak demand during the non-zero hours, which is more relevant because then we have to ensure even if it's two 50GW, that's a huge number to meet. And which is why I think what the government is doing, that they have set out very clear targets, whether it's for coal, nuclear, renewables and hydro also. But the fact remains that is where the gap is. I would put out mine. I can say that if we actually need to do 270 in the evening, that would be something.

What? Because at 250 meeting, 250 in the evening was a stretch. We had literally every horse running at that point of time. So that's a challenge. But yes, you're right. Uh, India has relied on coal because it's I mean, as far as I say, it's economics. For us, coal was there. Coal is cheap, coal is abundant. So it makes sense. And every country, every geography across the world has done that. So when people, particularly the Western media or the Western, uh, people talk or lecture as if I may use the word on, you know, trying to push coal, All we are trying to do is trying to get whatever is the cheapest source available at 70% cola, right?

Yeah. And but what's important is directionally the government is very clear. We are not saying we will keep on adding coal for eternity. We're also setting very, very ambitious targets for renewables. Government, in fact, also set very ambitious targets for nuclear, which is probably a bit too early to set now. But yes, we need to do that because nuclear also is ultimately clean. But the fact is that coal has been a mainstay and it will remain a very strong pillar going forward.

I'll probably not be able to give a number, but 25 years down the line will still have. But I sense that even in 2070 it may not be totally zero. Maybe some coal might still stay, but by then this entire energy supply mix would dramatically reverse to have a much larger share of clean supply into the system. The scale at which we are doing renewables, and of course, at which India is doing renewables, is probably among t