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Uttar Pradesh emerged as the country’s largest residential rooftop solar market in August, adding 228.95 MW, even as nationwide installations fell nearly 11.6% month-on-month to 1,407.32 MW after a record July, highlighting widening state-level momentum in the Centre’s flagship PM Surya Ghar: Muft Bijli Yojana.
Maharashtra added 212.51 MW during the month, followed by Andhra Pradesh at 192.39 MW, according to JMK Research’s August renewable-energy update. National residential rooftop additions had stood at 1,592 MW in July.
Despite the monthly moderation, the residential solar build-out has continued to expand rapidly. As of August, installed rooftop capacity under PM Surya Ghar reached 16,185.48 MW, covering 5.46 million households, the report showed.
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The August decline follows a particularly strong July. The Ministry of New and Renewable Energy said July recorded the highest-ever monthly rooftop solar installations under the scheme, with PM Surya Ghar crossing 5 million beneficiary households by early August. The programme was then adding around 100,000 beneficiary households every six days.
Government data showed the pace strengthening further through mid-August. As of August 12, 5.16 million households were benefiting from rooftop solar, with around ₹28,024 crore of subsidy transferred and nearly 1.9 million households reporting zero electricity bills. Rooftop capacity commissioned under the scheme had reached 14.8 GW by then.
The scheme, launched in February 2024 with an outlay of ₹75,021 crore, aims to install rooftop solar across 10 million households by FY27 and provide up to 300 units of free electricity a month. Central financial assistance is pegged at ₹30,000 for a 1-kW system, ₹60,000 for 2 kW and ₹78,000 for systems of 3 kW or above.
The scale-up has been sharp. By July 2026, the scheme had already benefited more than 4.8 million households, compared with just 794,000 rooftop installations recorded during the decade before the programme’s launch.
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The Centre has now set an interim goal of reaching 7.5 million households by December 2026, before moving towards the 10 million target. It has also introduced a utility-linked aggregation model, under which nearly 3 million rooftop installations are planned across states to accelerate adoption among underserved households.
TOPICSSolar EnergyThis article was first uploaded on September fourteen, twenty twenty-six, at six minutes past twelve in the am. © The Indian Express (P) Ltd