Eco India: What is digital solar, and can it push urban Indians to switch from using fossil fuels?

[@sundaygrids]

Hey Scroll team, thanks for featuring us :) Would love to hear your queries or notes on digital solar, happy to help!

[@jagniyantlunagariya3922]

I am living in Rajkot, Gujarat. My Discom is not listed on your website.

[@mathewsam]

From what we know, both Dakshin Gujarat Vij and Paschim Gujarat Vij are the utilities operating in Rajkot. And both of them are available on our platform. If your utility is not the ones aforementioned, could you let us know?

[@nitinsingh81]

Share yr website here

[@kragoth]

do you guys plan to add residential solar in your mix? a lot of us have large solar installations on our rooftops (10kw) and Flexi plans for residential solar: taking the extra solar generation (mostly during winters) from residential solar and selling it digitally most people like us install extra capacity than needed due to summer AC usage

[@chaitanyamahajan8289]

Guys, you should try to connect to Ivy Protocol in Berlin which is working on a similar concept using Blue Carbon.

[@riyasingla2204]

So glad to see that the scroll team covered initiatives like SundayGrid & PeriUrja! Like Shail metioned, climate change is the biggest battle of our times!

[@jay6645]

I saw the website. I think summary is: You buy a portion of the panel which someone else uses. In return you get credits which you can use to pay your electricity bill (which continues to come from fossil-fuels). BUT, because these guys are middlemen, they would be taking a cut. Also, though we get some credits for some months/years, we don't end up owning a solar panel at the end.

[@sundaygrids]

Our power grid gets electricity from a mix of sources, adding more solar to the grid makes it that much lesser dependent on fossil fuels and cleaner!

[@Saurabh.P]

42% electricity in India is already fossil free and will be 50% by 2030.

[@mihirdalal5303]

No company can operate without a business model. There is nothing wrong in their taking a cut. They are solving a real problem. They are making unlimited amount of solar capacity available to high rise dwellers who otherwise have no access to solar.

[@puneetbiswas9524]

I agree with you. Adoption is not going to increase as fast it is needed. But this startups like these will help people who want to do business in the power market to make their first move by installing solar panels with their own effort and the effort and fruits of one entrepreneur will motivate others.

[@jay6645]

@@Saurabh.P how much of that 42% is nuclear fission sourced?

[@zhappy]

I think the ideal solution would be that people who can put up solar panels are easily able to do so and sell excess electricity back to the government/power distributor. This way they can avoid this roundabout way of sharing excess electricity. But until then, this is a working solution.

[@crazydrifter13]

Went right over my head but if it's real progress then big thumbs up

[@Sagittarius-A-Star]

Rooftop solar on these high-rises should also be used to create a shady garden/playground or even for growing fruits/herbs/vegetables.

[@sumanthsure]

Awesome

[@jalexrosh]

I'm getting a 5KW solar power plant installed on my rooftop. It will set me back by 3 lakh rupees. And this is after MNRE subsidy

[@aleenaprasannan2146]

If I'm not wrong, the customers are buying the carbon offset credits from this company as a digital currency and paying their electricity bills with it. That does leave a huge '?' of how the monetization is legitimized. Like someone else pointed out, what mechanism is there for the customer to verify that the currency or 'wallets' are not duplicates? How does the value of the wallet change based on changes in the number of customers v/s energy produced, especially with seasonal solar output variations. Are the value of the wallets based on the government's fixture of value for carbon credits and do they have other independent agencies auditing their carbon offsets? Carbon crediting is still nascent in India, it's history is other places is riddled with corruption and this one kind of really confused the heck out of people and left people with more questions than answers. There needs to be better informative, much more transparent reporting when introducing something that has already earned a reputation for often being in grey area internationally

[@sundaygrids]

Hi Aleena! So SundayGrids don’t pass along carbon offset credits or other green attributes of any manner. Instead when users reserve on our platform, they recieve bill credits, which are used to add on top of their power bills as discounts. Thes bill credits are essentially what the host (who uses the electricity) pays you for the power from your reserved portion of the solar panels. No trading of carbon certificates takes place on our platform. Our goal here is to provide an alternative to those who cant install panels on their rooftops, and very much like rooftop solar, there would be seasonal fluctuations. When we calculate power generation, we take those fluctuations into account (from historic data and weather forecasts etc) and then show the data to you, and the value on the wallet is dependant only on the users reserved solar capacity, it doesn't fluctuate with more users joining the platform. Hope this helps!

[@CatsOfMarrakech]

Slightly hard to conceptualize yet fascinating

[@rajgor8651]

Fantastic Initiative by Scroll to make such videos, this topics will slowly popularise, good content!

[@xyz-oy3ru]

Feels like NFT, but linked with a tangible thing.

[@amandeep9930]

So the concept goas like this - you create a digital wallet and buy a solar panel in some location you don't know. As that solar panel generates power, you get solar credits of the same value in your wallet which you can use to pay off your electricity bill. The concept looks interesting, but I don't understand one thing - why don't the company directory sells the power generated by panels to the government? Or why don't they create an energy company like Ambani which sells electricity directly to customers? You can even brand your company as completely green energy provider and charge a primium.

[@lhxperimental]

They would need to bring capital to procure and install the solar panels. Here they are crowdsourcing the capital. They are like REITs for solar. They are unnecessarily complicating their messaging by saying "you can use the credits to offset your electricity bill". It is actually an investment scheme which gives dividends based on the energy produced.

[@drraghunath83]

how do you guarantee that the 2 KW amount of panels that you have sold to me is not sold to someone else?

[@sundaygrids]

The credits our users receive come from the solar power generated. If duplication happens (which is restricted from happening in irl algorithimically), say 2 KW as in this example, the platform would be at a disadvantage by having a deficit caused from having to pass along the same amount of credits (2 KW of solar roughly generates ₹1400 of credits monthly) to two users, while we receive credits from host only for the electricity from 2 KW they consume.

[@shivarakesh5541]

Good video

[@rupalijambhekar3219]

Super interesting win win eco friendly solution

[@alwayscuriousbutsad6584]

great coverage

[@vthilton]

Save Our Planet - Share

[@priyapriyanka4170]

Great idea.....but what i felt was u need to do video or explain , which can be understand easily by everyone so tht many can join you ....solar cloud mind blowing idea ...this is going to be very big market in future 👍all the best team

[@heeman9]

Sunday grid is awoesome

[@braunarsch]

how does digital solar work during loadshedding or power cut?

[@sundaygrids]

Much like any regular solar actually. If they are net-metered solar systems, it would be on pause until the grid gets back online. But the benefit of net-metering far outweighs the occasional disruption as it allows us to store surplus power with the grid to use it at night or when it's cloudy out there.

[@s.lionelmcauley4455]

@@sundaygrids adding storage to the mix makes for greater access to premium rate tariffs. Please do not provide a single reason why you can not.

[@karthicknara]

This digital solar seems to be targeting guilt rather than attempt to change human behaviour to a sustainable solutions.

[@siddheshkinhekar4290]

Please also make video on solar cooker such as Scheffler, parabolic and box cooker 🙏

[@bhatkrishnakishor]

Before buying, first ask your family if they will cook in it, considering the limitations. Telling you from experience 😂

[@blesschacko3264]

DW news logo in the background. Copyright infringement

[@precious_786]

7:40 - " right " seems to be takiya kalam i.e "sahi hai" 😂 Right ?

[@gurusguru]

1. How do you compensate the host ? 2. Does the host get to reserve some capacity at rates which would be lower than what you retail to individual users ? 3. Is it that the balance of the capacity is then retailed out ?

[@arshnarula9032]

After 15 years , they leave their solar panel with the host , and they also provide cheap electricity to host , which brings down their electricity cost by 30-40% , thats what they mentioned on their website

[@alo1236546]

Energy saving is the key, not just solar energy. Remember the giant computer to nowaday tablet

[@jay6645]

Could not understand the concept here.

[@punithraj619]

me too , seen the video 2 times but didnot get clarity ..

[@jay6645]

@@punithraj619 I saw the website. It seems you buy a portion of the panel which someone else uses. In return you get credits which you can use to pay your electricity bills. BUT, because these guys are middlemen, they would be taking a cut. Also, though we get some credits for some months/years, we don't end up owning a solar panel at the end.

[@gurusguru]

1. Is this in compliance with central and local regulations. This is like private production and selling of energy. Is that allowed in India ? 2. If solar energy is being produced in Maharashtra and credits are being utilised in Karnataka, do the local DISCOMS have no charges to be paid ? If yes, who pays for the same

[@jayvlugt3309]

digital solar? So you can download power?

[@testingk410]

But it return less then fix deposit

[@pareshdixit6152]

seems like a scam to me, why not start a digital water, digital wind and digital nuclear? A good ppt and website can make you fall for anything.

[@sundaygrids]

Digital Solar is a moniker we use to highlight access over the internet, much like how cloud kitchens differentiate from regular kitchens. SundayGrids is built on top of the community solar frameworks, which has already been a major facilitator of going solar in Europe and US.

[@sumanchakraborty4747]

Yes put the money & then read in newspaper that one fine day company have gone bust with all money missing! Never invest in this type of amateur initiatives! First ask what will happen if pay back defaults! 99% ANSWER WILL be WHATABOUTRY! No regulator, no one to complaint, never invest based on sweet talks!

[@gokulraj1989]

He has not created anything. carbon credits are already there. He has just relabelled it as solar credit.