SBI extends Rs 2,317 cr loans to rooftop solar projects

State Bank of India (SBI) has extended Rs 2,317 crore of financing for the rooftop solar power projects in collaboration with World Bank. Sanction letters have been handed out to JSW Energy, Hinduja Renewable Energy, Azure Energy, Adani Group and Hero Solar Energy.

Under this arrangement, SBI will take a line of credit of $625 million from World Bank. This money will be held in the bank's overseas book and domestic rupee loans will be given to the companies against this.

Under this funding arrangement which will be priced at 15 basis points above Libor, 43 projects will be financed which will add 695 mega watt (mw) of solar rooftop capacity to the grid. Rajnish Kumar, chairman, SBI, said in a press conference, "This is clean energy and capturing the biggest natural resource in India to add to the existing power capacity."

"SBI has about Rs 12,000 crore of loans to the renewable sector, the non performing assets (NPAs) to the sector are negligible," Kumar added.

At the end of the first quarter ended June 30, 2017, SBI had an infrastructure portfolio of Rs 2,54,219 crore, of which power constituted the largest chunk at Rs 1,71,645 crore, followed by telecommunication which had loans outstanding of Rs 22,497 crore. Roads and ports were at Rs 28,011 crore and other infrastructure, Rs 32,066 crore.

The year-on-year growth for both power and telecommunication was 3.4% and 8.98% respectively. The roads and ports sector and other infrastructure reported negative growth of 13.47% and 15.21% respectively over the previous year.