Indian private-sector refiner Reliance Industries (RIL) has acquired a solar panel producer and agreed to buy a 40pc stake in a solar project contractor, as it transitions from an oil company to a clean energy firm.
RIL paid $771mn to buy Norway-based REC Solar from China National Bluestar, whose parent is China's state-owned ChemChina. REC has two units in Norway making solar-grade polysilicon and a unit in Singapore that produces panels and modules. It has separately agreed to purchase a 40pc stake in Sterling and Wilson Solar, an Indian engineering, procurement and construction firm that has executed over 11GW gigawatts of solar projects, RIL said.
RIL, India's second-largest refiner after state-owned IOC, is investing around $10bn to build four gigafactories — an integrated solar photovoltaic module factory, energy storage battery plant, electrolyser factory to produce green hydrogen and fuel cell plant — over the next three years to reduce dependence on earnings from oil and expand into clean energy.
RIL plans to be a net-zero carbon company by 2030.

