El Niño could redraw India’s power plans as cooling load surges past renewable gaps

KOLKATA, India's power planners are staring at a new challenge. The El Niño weather pattern is not just cutting wind and solar output, it is driving up cooling demand so fast that it now overshadows the renewable energy shortfall itself.

A recent analysis by Down To Earth shows that during the 2023 El Niño, peak electricity demand in India rose 15% above normal in May and June. The bulk of that jump came from air conditioners, fans, and refrigerators running longer and harder. At the same time, wind generation dropped by roughly 12% in key states like Tamil Nadu and Gujarat, while solar output fell by 5-7% in parts of central India due to cloud cover and heat haze.

"The old assumption was that renewable shortages were the main risk to the grid," said a senior official at the Central Electricity Authority who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorised to brief the press. "Now we see that the demand side, specifically cooling, can be a bigger and faster problem."

The numbers back him up. In June 2023, the all-India peak demand hit 224 gigawatts, beating the previous record by nearly 10 GW. Coal-fired plants ran at 78% capacity, their highest in four years. The power ministry had to invoke an emergency clause to force idle gas plants to run.

Cooling load is the new baseload

India has added 18 GW of solar and 5 GW of wind capacity since 2020. But the rise in cooling demand has eaten up almost all of that new supply. A study by the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay, found that every degree Celsius rise in temperature above 30°C adds roughly 2 GW to the national peak load, the equivalent of switching on a small city's worth of air conditioners.

"El Niño years make this worse because the heat starts earlier and lasts longer," said Dr. Meera Krishnan, a climate scientist at the Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology. "The monsoon is delayed or weaker, so people rely on mechanical cooling for weeks more than usual."

The 2023 El Niño was one of the strongest on record, with sea-surface temperatures in the Pacific rising 1.8°C above average. Forecasts from the India Meteorological Department suggest a 70% chance of another El Niño developing by mid-2025.

Policy gaps exposed

India's National Electricity Plan, released in 2023, projects that renewable energy will meet 50% of total generation by 2030. But the plan does not model a scenario where cooling demand grows faster than renewable supply during heatwaves.

"We need a separate cooling-demand forecast for El Niño years," said Rajesh Agarwal, a former member of the Central Electricity Regulatory Commission. "Otherwise we will keep scrambling for coal every summer."

The government has taken some steps. In March 2024, the Bureau of Energy Efficiency revised its star-labelling norms for air conditioners, requiring 15% higher efficiency by 2026. The Ministry of Power also launched a demand-response pilot in Delhi, paying industrial users to shift their load away from peak hours.

But these measures are small compared to the scale of the problem. India has roughly 50 million air conditioners today. That number is expected to hit 1.2 billion by 2050, according to the International Energy Agency. If even half of them run during an El Niño summer, the grid could face a 40 GW shortfall.

Renewables still needed, but differently

Wind and solar remain central to India's decarbonisation goals. But their output drops during the very heatwaves that drive up cooling demand. Wind speeds fall when temperatures rise, and solar panels lose efficiency above 45°C.

"The solution is not to slow down renewables, it's to back them with firm capacity," said Krishnan. "That means storage, gas peakers, or hydro. And we need to start building them now."

The Ministry of New and Renewable Energy has tendered 10 GW of battery storage projects, but only 2 GW have been awarded so far. Pumped-hydro projects, which can store energy for hours, face land and water disputes in states like Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh.

Meanwhile, the power ministry is pushing states to update their building codes to mandate cool roofs and reflective paints. Tamil Nadu became the first state to require cool roofs in all new commercial buildings starting January 2025.

"Every watt saved from cooling is a watt that doesn't need to come from coal," said the CEA official. "That's the cheapest power plant of all."