this story originally appeared in on mar 26 2015 mumbai stateowned banks will actively promote green energy considered vital for powerstarved india and have assured the finance ministry to provide around rs 171 lakh crore to the sector in project financing over the next five years this will help generate 34000 megawatts of nonconventional power like wind and solar energy in this period banking behemoth state bank of india has taken the lead with a rs 75000crore commitment aimed at generating 15000 megawatt of green power followed by idbi which committed rs 14700 crore with 2940 megawatt people familiar with the matter told et sbi chairman arundhati bhattacharya confirmed the development saying that green energy lending would be a relatively safer asset and this will spur the countrys growth banking exposure to the power sector is 9 of the total industry loans or about rs 55 lakh crore data from rbi show according a market estimates renewable energy capacity installed makes up for 15 of the total capacity installed in india thus the estimated bank lending to renewable energy is at 115 of the total banking system loans the indian banking sectors current lowtomoderate level exposure to green energy projects could increase sharply over the mediumterm given the rising importance of clean energy in todays world and the governments emphasis on it said karthik srinivasan senior vicepresident icra a rating company sticking to its poll promises the narendra modiled nda government has planned to expand nonconventional power generation seeking to reduce its dependence on coal key for producing thermal power the government according to media reports has aimed to install 100000 mw solar energy by 2022 it also planned to put in place 60000 mw of wind power capacity by then we have committed credit lines to different green energy projects in the next five years said bk batra deputy managing director at idbi bank green energy be it solar or wind wont have limitations in terms of availability unlike coal or gas loan default risk is mitigated compared to other power projects in a meeting with the finance ministry a few weeks ago some 27 stateowned banks have agreed to extend credit to nonconventional energy projects this is the first time that staterun banks have given large credit commitments to the government of this magnitude bank of baroda and bank of india will sanction rs 12500 crore and rs 10000 crore credits the green energy sector including wind and solar looks promising said shushil munot cmd bank of maharashtra with lower maintenance cost and falling capital requirements business viability is improving significantly this is a step forward for nationbuilding similarly bank of maharashtra punjab national bank union bank of india are supposed to lend rs 7500 crore each