Merchant risk fully contracted away via 25-yr AESL PPAs.

Is it possible to share the gross block and run-rate EBITDA for 15.8GW capacity?

So, the current gross block of the company is INR 89,000 crores approximately, and the run rate EBITDA for the Q1, it is about INR 13,600 crores. And on a yearly basis, it will be about INR 17,000 crores.

Is it possible to share the capacity commissioned in value term in Q1 FY '26? If I remember number correctly, I think we have installed 1.6 gigawatt, correct? And is it possible to share the capacity commissioned in terms of value rupees crores?

Okay. So, the CapEx, see, generally our CapEx is in the range of, for the solar, it is INR 4.5 crores; for wind, it is INR 6.5 crores. So, the current CapEx for the first quarter of current year booking was about Rs 6,500 crores.

One clarification on the accounting side, the associate income, I think we booked in the quarter of INR 111 crores. Is it primarily due to Mundra green, Mundra technology, that solar manufacturer?

It's Mundra Solar Energy Limited, where we have 25% stake within that company. So, whatever profits they generate, we get a 25% share of the same.

Given the fact that most of the capacity are coming in Khavda, do you see any transmission challenges which are coming up, which are causing some challenges in commissioning these capacities?

It's a valid point, Mohit. I think it is very difficult to tie both the things, your capacities with the transmission capacities. There will be always some lag of weeks or months in that process. Having said that, in the current context, yes, there is a little bit of a challenge coming from Khavda evacuation. However, having said that, it's hardly less than 5% of our EBITDA as we speak. We are very closely monitoring and largely supporting how the evacuation from Khavda is coming out. And we do believe that this fiscal year and much before that, there will be enough evacuation for us to evacuate everything. So, we don't foresee a big challenge in the coming quarters. But yes, a few weeks here and there, can always be an overlap in this process. Good part is that, if you look at in the Q2, most of what is going to be evacuated will be wind more than the solar. And hence, that daytime challenge is also mitigated from that standpoint.

Regarding the solar CUF, capacity utilization factor. In this quarter, we were close to 28%. But in the earlier presentations, we had mentioned that it was 32% in the Khavda region. So, the lower CUF this quarter is due to the early monsoon?

I think, you see Khavda has the distinction of one of the best irradiations possible. And so, our CUF there is always higher. As and when the proportion of Khavda in the overall portfolio is going to increase, we will appreciate more and more CUF come in on the higher side in our overall portfolio. So currently, since it's only one-third of it, you will find that it is much lower than Khavda.

What is the average merchant price that we sold for the quarter?

On the solar side, our average is Rs2.20, but the wind has been nominally well at Rs5.70.

We have 3.5 gigawatt of approximate target for this year. When can we expect, what in Q2 or Q3?

See, we are on track. If you see on a 5 gigawatt target for the year, we have already done around one-third. What is expected from the next three quarters, if you ask me, we are very well on track. We're on track for these capacities. You will be there with us after three months and we will share with you what we have added in the next Q2.

This merchant and infirm power, that is, mostly wind only, right? I mean, the sale of power of say around 2,000 units. So that is mostly wind or what would be the segregation like?

No, it's a mix of solar and wind both. And it is also pre-COD power for some of our PPAs. So, what we do is, obviously, there are transmission connectivity deadlines. We commission the projects much ahead of that and see that our returns in those projects are enhanced because of this early commissioning of projects, which are not necessarily baked in when we do the bidding. So, we are adding that much value. So, there is revenue coming from those projects. Plus, we have pure-play merchant projects where we have multiple optionalities for future. There is revenue to that. So, it's predominantly solar if you ask me. On an overall merchant strategy, yes, you are right, that it is tilting towards more wind projects taking the shape of merchant revenue in proportions more.

On your other expenditure. There has been some reclassification, I think the foreign exchange part, I think you've clubbed it in one of the expense. So, this INR 300 crores are basically, what could be the adjustments? Is it foreign exchange or something else is also there?

Yes. So, see, there is -- there are two parts to it. There is a foreign exchange gain loss, which is either shown in the part of other income, which is there as a gain in this quarter, very small number. In case of the finance cost, that foreign exchange is basically the hedging cost that we pay, plus whatever the ERD that we have to value the loans which are there as ECBs in terms of those valuation, fair valuation that we do at the end of the quarter, whatever the unrealized gain/loss that occurs is also part of the finance cost in that case.

My first question is on the growth of energy sales, if we see that is around 42% in this quarter by Y-o-Y. However, the revenue growth is around 30%. So just wanted to understand, and since we have sold, I think more than 40% in merchant market, so is this because solely because of that, the lower merchant prices?

Yes. Predominantly you can attribute it to that. So, as earlier said, so merchant prices are volatile, and it is basically part of the business case when you talk about pure-play merchant. So, we have two parts, about 50% of it basically pure-play merchant and 50% is infirm revenue. So, the infirm revenue where we have sold on merchant markets, it is basically the pre-COD revenue before commercial operation date. So that entire revenue is incremental to whatever, basically, we were going to earn under a PPA of 25 years. Second part, the merchant revenues, as I said, it is volatile. In Q1, it has been less because of the monsoon arriving early and possibly things could change in the later quarters. The third part is the new PPAs that we are implementing. Gradually, over many years, the tariffs have gone down and that is because of the technology evolution and CapEx going down. So, the return expectations on the PPAs remain the same, but the tariff trajectory is down, and the CapEx is also down. So, these are the combination of reasons because of which it appears so. But from a return expectation standpoint, we are not really compromising in any way.

Because of this early monsoon onset and since there was this solar overcapacity, was there any back down due to the grid during, particularly during the peak solar hours that we have faced in this quarter?

Yes, we did mention earlier too, there have been certain back downs with respect to grid evacuations. But at the current level, it is less than the 5% of our EBITDA margins as such. And I think we had a detailed discussion, I can say or explanation on how the evacuation capacities are going to come and how we are mapping them and monitoring them so closely in that particular manner. And like I said, since in this quarter, the solar would be relatively less and the wind would be high, we do believe, and because of the timings of the wind, which are generally more in the evening hours and in the morning hours, we don't expect that much impact on the wind part of it. And solar in any case would be lesser in the last year.

Out of this, around 33 gigawatt of locked-in capacity that we have, what is the capacity that is tied up under PPA?

Yes, we have, as I talked about 36.5 gigawatt in total, which is coming across. Within that, 31.5 gigawatt is what is currently with the PPA. If you total what I have told you, it'll total to around at 36.5 gigawatt. Like I said, 31.5 gigawatt of it is under PPA.

And this Adani-Total JV, how much capacity is operational and how much is in pipeline right now?

So, total 4.5-gigawatt portfolio we have, and out of that, roughly 4 gigawatt is operational right now in the JV.

We are not seeing you in the FDRE market. You're there in wind, solar hybrid. Is there anything we should read into that?

No, I think, we just said that we are very selective in what we do. And we want to see tenders where we know that the tie-ups would happen and we would make returns better than what market is making. So, all of those are the considerations where we choose what we want, where we want to be. We are in some FDRE tenders where the storage is there. So, it depends on the tender data, but yes, we have our own strategy about participating and winning some tenders.

You talked about revenue from early commissioning of projects. Our understanding was that thing was now done away. You can't early commission. Are there some projects for which there have been some exemptions?

So, it really depends on the PPAs and how the -- when are we commissioning and what are the conditions of such commissioning when we are commissioning them? So, I think that's what I was alluding to you earlier, is that if my transmission elements are still not there, I'm commissioning capacities, then there are certain cases where I am able to do this pre-COD power. Obviously, it is dependent on, the buying party, how they look at it, how would they -- what -- how -- what kind of conditions they want to put up for that purchase. So, it depends on PPA to PPA. What we are telling you is that we have significant capacities, where we have been able to achieve this and where we are supplying that power on a pre-COD basis, including in some cases to the PPA counterpart also. In both the cases, obviously, it adds revenue to the already bid-out number or bid-out returns which we had. So, it's an additional earning which we can do.

Can you tell us what is the gross debt levels for the quarter? And what was the borrowing cost?

So, the gross debt as on June 30 is INR 78,000 crores. And borrowing cost is generally, currently the range is 9.1% to 9.2% for us.

And for the full year, are we expecting gross debt to come down?

No, gross debt will not come down for sure. The borrowing cost, yes, we are looking to refinance certain portion of our assets. So, from that aspect, we will keep on looking at it from that perspective. See as such, because we keep on adding new construction also, so it'll not be coming down very drastically. But yes, we keep on evaluating and looking at how refinancing takes place and thereby reduce the cost to whatever extent we can from the existing operating projects.

Regarding the merchant price you mentioned, it was INR 2.20 for solar and INR 5.70 for the wind. What was the prices last quarter?

Q4, yes. So, see, what happens is that the wind merchant prices generally for Q3 and Q4 are generally a bit lower. So, it was in the range of about INR 4.70 in wind. And for solar it was near to INR 3.00.

Could you just elaborate on the two PSP projects in the Andhra Pradesh, which has been cancelled, but Kurukutty and the Karrivalasa PSP projects? And would this cancellation have any kind of an impact on our targeted 5 gigawatt of PSP addition by FY '30-'31?

So, that does not -- to be very clear, that does not impact our 5 gigawatt of PSP additions. We have significantly more pipelines in terms of the opportunities which -- for which we look at execution even beyond FY '30, and as well as, as upsides to our current plan of 5 gigawatt. We evaluate multiple capacities and that's how something will come in and something will go out based on various scenarios.

Are we seeing any kind of labor issues in terms of execution? We have been hearing across other players as well, where Labor availability is a concern, whether it's on the EPC front or evacuation on the transmission side. So, are we facing similar kind of an issue at Khavda as well? And if yes, what measures are we taking to address it?

Thanks, Anuj. I think you must appreciate the fact that when you are -- when someone has an aspiration to grow at this level and build a project like Khavda, the good part is that for us and as well as for the labor, you have next five-year horizon available with them. Important factor, if you look at it, is this transition from one project to the other. It's not that the labor is not available in this country. So, like what we have done is that we have created infrastructure for them, our labour colony is the best equipped. We have created infrastructure; we are giving them the facilities. So, and they don't have to move on from X to Y. Typically, in a solar plant, if you look at, the challenge is that you build that solar plant in nine months' time, and then again, they have to move from X to Y area. The best part about a place like Khavda is that we are there for next five years for 30 gigawatts. Having created that infrastructure, having given them the facilities, I would really request and suggest please come to Khavda and look at the way we are supporting and facilitating this labour to stay, to play, having the best food for them, and all the other infrastructure which we have created for them.

How the DCR cell efficiencies are working on. We are also hearing from many of other IPPs or developers that the DCR cells are not up to the mark in terms of the efficiency. Would higher implementation of DCRs going ahead would have any kind of an impact on the targeted efficiency or the generation which we have set aside for our projects?

Currently, we don't have those in our portfolio, based on what we are generating right now, especially in Khavda and whatever we are executing. So, it's a hypothetical question for us. But believe me, from a Group where we are, the focus, which is given on quality, I personally will not subscribe to this fact that the DCR products will be anywhere lower in their performance than anyone else. You may say that our cost of DCR may be on the higher side, but for me to comment that the performance will be on the lower side, I will not personally subscribe to it with my experience.

While going through the earnings presentation I saw the wind CUF which was at 42.3%, which is a very strong number. Was it because of the early onset of monsoon? And the plant availability factor was at 95.5%. So, this CUF of 42.3%, was it factoring the plant availability factor or it's the total number?

Yes, so I think it is -- first, I would not say that CUF at Khavda has been only because of the early onset of monsoon. I think like we have been saying and I also made it clear at our opening statement that these sites were chosen, and we are very happy for what we have chosen to be, where we are building, what we are building, and what is coming out is the predictable model which is now coming as a reality. As well as your question about availability to the CUF concerned, yes, you must take into consideration the availability factor in place and that's where we are. You also must appreciate the fact that in Q1, the availability also goes low because you have a six-month maintenance schedule for many of our turbines.

I wanted to know your thoughts on renewable energy demand from data centers. And just wanted to understand how discussions are going on with these players, especially MNCs, and what kind of contracts you are getting into and what kind of growth runway you see in that area.

Yes, sure. So that's an interesting market and with the way data is being now hosted in India, for India's consumption as well as the new A.I. demand as well as the focus of some of these data centers to have green power, it's a significant opportunity for us. And that's where you see, in our overall mix for FY '30, we have said that 25% of our capacities would be seeing some of these kinds of markets. So, it's pretty much part of our focus area as a potential source of off-take. And there is a keen interest from the -- some of these data centers.

And the contract would be long-term, or do they prefer to procure on spot basis?

So, it depends on the buyer and the seller. A lot of these guys who want to do a 10-year contract or a 15-year contract, because that's kind of a visibility you -- they see in their own industry. Obviously, the risk adjusted value which comes to both the sides needs to reflect that. And that's what happens in some of these contracts. So, spot market is there obviously and there is nothing as a contract. They will secure some short supplies. We are there in that market as well. The pricing reflects the tenure in that case. So, all of that is something which is a trade of a B2B market. So, I think, as a company, we are ready to take that exposure and that's where we are saying that 25% of the capacity will be available in the merchant exposure, C&I, CFDs, or mixed hybrid contracts.

Can you please comment on the quarterly swings in the NCI line? How much of the NCI capacity is yet to be commissioned and any timelines for the same?

So, see, out of, 4,500 capacities with Total as a joint venture, about 4,000-odd capacity has already been commissioned, and another 500 is in pipeline will be commissioned by next six months to one year. So, after that, that swing from that perspective should be minimal except for the distributions and the other things.