India shifts focus to renewables and batteries, halts new coal plants for 5 years.

India has announced that it will not consider any proposals for new coal plants for the next five years and will instead focus on growing its renewables sector, according to an updated national electricity plan. The plan proposes the build-out of more than 8,600 megawatts of battery energy storage systems instead of nearly 8,000 megawatts of new coal capacity that was projected in a draft of the plan released in September. India plans to install 500 gigawatts of clean energy by 2030, enough energy to power anywhere from 150 to 500 million homes depending on power use, but is not on course to meet that target.