N K Ranganath managing director of Grundfos India, a subsidiary of the Danish Grundfos Pumps, said the company plans to invest $36.3million in supply of solar pumps for agriculture. The company has been supplying solar pumps in villages for drinking water since the past four years, he added.
The government, which has pledged grants to help raise agricultural yields and reduce use of expensive diesel fuel, estimates that the country will draw $1.6 billion of investment over five years as the first 200,000 most easily replaceable pumps change to solar. Switching 26 million groundwater pumps on farms that suffer from blackouts and volatile fuel costs to run on solar may save $6 billion a year in India power and diesel subsidies.
The state of Maharashtra said it will install 500,000 farm solar pumps over a year, and Grundfos plans to bid for this requirement.
