Forty years of Indian wind

Cumulative capacity stands at 0.05 GW in 1993 and reaches only 0.95 GW by 2000, a first decade in which the line barely lifts off the axis.

MP Windfarms Limited pioneers wind-estate development in 1995, and the curve steepens: 2.8 GW by 2004, 10.7 GW by 2009, then 32.6 GW by 2017.

By FY2025-26 the workbook records 57 GW across its validated project rows, extending the existing cumulative series through 2026.

The first 10 GW takes nineteen years, from 1990 to 2009, making it the widest segment on the chart and the slowest tranche the sector has ever added.

Between 2014 and 2017 India adds its third 10 GW in just three years, compressing into one auction cycle the volume that once needed two decades.

Since 2009 every 10 GW tranche has landed in three to five years, and the 2022 to 2025 step repeats the three-year pace on the way to roughly 50 GW.

Across three decades 72.6% of all capacity is commissioned in March, the fiscal year-end, and the March band sits above all other months in nearly every year.

In 2017, 4,743 MW of the year's 5,143 MW lands in March as developers race to commission before competitive bidding begins in 2018.

Even under auctions the fingerprint survives: 3,370 MW of 2025 capacity carries a March date against just 20 MW across all other months combined.

By 1999 NEPC and NEG-Micon lead the young market with 326 MW built, ahead of Vestas-RRB at 146 MW, Enercon at 98 MW and Aban-Kenetech at 95 MW.

The whole first gigawatt runs on roughly 225 kW machines, so Das Lagerwey's 50 MW alone represents more than two hundred separate turbines on the ground.

Suzlon sits at the bottom of the 1990s table with 40 MW, yet it is the only name here still shipping turbines; the rest of the cohort has disappeared.

Suzlon holds 48.4% of MW commissioned in 2005 and never leaves the chart, while every rival band around it either appears late or vanishes entirely.

Gamesa climbs from 0.1% of build in 2008 to 32.0% by 2016, then falls to 0.2% by 2024 as the business is folded into Siemens Gamesa.

GE and SGRE together account for 43.6% of MW commissioned in 2024, so the sector's current suppliers were absent or negligible before 2012.

Suzlon commissions 8 MW in 1996 and stays under 150 MW a year through 2004, then jumps to 813 MW in 2005 as the depreciation boom takes hold.

A peak of 1,741 MW in 2017 gives way to just 187 MW in both 2020 and 2021, tracking the auction transition and a near-bankruptcy in the same window.

Recovery is jagged: 996 MW in 2024 is the strongest year since 2017, but 2025 drops back to 177 MW, below even the post-auction low.

The median installed turbine holds at 0.25 MW from 1994 to 1998, interrupted only by a brief 0.3 MW step in 1997 — close to a decade of identical hardware.

Each jump is followed by a pause: 0.6 MW in 2002, 1.25 MW held from 2005 to 2009, then 1.5 MW through 2014 before the 2 MW class settles in.

Median rating reaches 3.3 MW in 2025, thirteen times the 1994 level, which is exactly why swapping 250 kW units on proven sites carries such large upside.

Mean project size is 1.0 MW in 1994 and still only 1.3 MW in 2004, the arithmetic signature of single-turbine captive installations bought for tax relief.

From 3.1 MW in 2011 the mean climbs to 4.8 MW in 2012 and 8.3 MW in 2013, as developers building for tenders displace individual captive buyers.

The 2020 mean of 36.9 MW and 34.4 MW in 2025 are roughly 35 times the captive-era baseline — a different financing and land-assembly problem altogether.

Tamil Nadu carries 11.59 GW, second only to Gujarat, yet its capacity-weighted turbine rating of 1,468 kW is the lowest of all seven major states.

Gujarat's 13.44 GW averages 2,157 kW because most of it arrived after the 2 MW class, opening a 689 kW gap over the state that started first.

Maharashtra's 5.25 GW averages just 1,502 kW, so together with Tamil Nadu it forms the pool of old, small hardware that repowering economics target first.

Corporate captive buyers take 81.0% of new capacity in 2005 and stay above 70% in most years before 2013, while the IPP band is barely visible.

IPP share moves from 0.3% in 2004 to 36.9% in 2013 and 44.0% in 2016, because competitive tenders reward whoever can build and finance at scale.

By 2023 IPPs take 76.1% of new build and 69.8% in 2025, so the sector's typical counterparty today is a balance-sheet developer, not a tax-driven owner.

2,657 of the 5,723 owners on the register hold exactly one turbine, a first bar more than two and a half times the height of the next category.

Owners of two to five turbines add another 1,977 names, so holdings of five turbines or fewer account for roughly 81% of everyone in the dataset.

Only 148 owners hold more than 50 turbines, which means any large repowering programme has to assemble agreement across thousands of very small holders.

Tamil Nadu passes 1 GW in 2003 and reaches 7.07 GW by 2012, holding first place comfortably while Gujarat is still just above 3.0 GW.

Gujarat climbs from 4.13 GW in 2016 to 11.87 GW in 2024, adding more capacity in eight years than Tamil Nadu had built in its entire first eighteen.

The lead changes hands in 2024 and widens by 2025 to 13.39 GW for Gujarat against 11.56 GW for Tamil Nadu, with Karnataka a distant third at 6.86 GW.

The South takes 83.1% of new capacity in 1994 and still 80.3% in 2004, a period when the western desert states hold under a fifth of annual build.

Desert share overtakes the South after 2019 and peaks at 66.6% in 2020, the same year the South's share of new build falls to 23.6%.

By 2024 the West holds 61.7% of new capacity against the South's 33.6%, which puts most new land, evacuation and investment demand in Gujarat and Rajasthan.

Kutch alone holds 6.32 GW, ahead of Jaisalmer at 4.04 GW and Tirunelveli at 3.83 GW, and ten districts between them carry 53% of national capacity.

Gujarat supplies both Kutch and Jamnagar's 2.36 GW while Tamil Nadu contributes three entries, so the head of the list is effectively a two-state race.

Below the top three the curve flattens quickly, with Dhule closing the list at 0.89 GW, so evacuation upgrades and repowering both land in a few districts.

Wind begins in five districts in 1994 and reaches only 26 by 2004, a first decade of build packed into a handful of proven coastal and hill corridors.

The count more than doubles from 61 districts in 2010 to 133 in 2016, the years when better resource maps and new evacuation opened fresh states.

195 districts carry wind by 2025, only nine more than in 2022, so growth now depends on densifying and repowering existing sites rather than new geography.

Capacity aged nought to nine years accounts for 51.6% of the fleet in 2025, a direct reflection of how much of it was commissioned after 2016.

The 15 to 19 year segment holds 17.3% and the 20-plus segment 8.3%, bracketing 25.5% of installed capacity that has already passed fifteen years of service.

8.3% of capacity is beyond its 20-year design life today, and the 22.9% now aged 10 to 14 years moves into that bracket within the next decade.

Machines below 0.5 MW make up 21% of every turbine ever installed but only 4% of capacity, the steepest downward slope anywhere on the chart.

The 0.5 to 1.0 MW band adds 28% of units for 16% of megawatts, so sub-1-MW hardware totals about 49% of turbines against 21% of installed capacity.

Above 2 MW the slopes reverse, with 30% of units carrying 51% of capacity, and that reversal is the whole arithmetic case for replacing small machines.

Adani Green Energy's 2025 Gujarat project is the largest single wind project ever built in India at 780 MW, some 65% bigger than the 473 MW runner-up.

Every one of the ten largest projects was commissioned between 2019 and 2025, all of them by IPPs and all on 2 to 5 MW turbine platforms.

Five of the ten sit in Gujarat, including ReNew Power's 250 MW from 2019, confirming that the mega-project tier is a western, utility-scale business today.