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In Gujarat's salt flats, the land is so saline and empty that even mobile signals disappear. Then the horizon changes. Wind turbines nearly 200 metres tall rise from the marsh. Solar panels stretch for kilometres. Trucks haul turbine blades longer than aircraft wings at dawn, before the heat makes work impossible.

This is Khavda – the world's largest renewable energy park. Spanning 726 square kilometres, the site is being built to generate 30 gigawatts of electricity by combining solar and wind on a single onshore site. When complete, it will produce enough power to supply a country the size of Chile or the Netherlands.

Khavda is coming up at a moment when India is adding renewable energy at one of the fastest rates globally, even as electricity demand continues to rise and coal remains central to the grid. China still dominates clean-energy manufacturing and deployment. The question India faces is whether renewables can now be built at a scale that delivers reliable power – and whether it can do so without long-term dependence on Chinese supply chains.

I visited Khavda and spoke to Adani executives and energy analysts about what it takes to build renewable power at this scale – from engineering turbines for 50C heat to integrating storage, transmission and manufacturing on site. The story on the ground is less about climate pledges, and more about economics, reliability and how the clean energy race is actually being fought.

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A view of Khavda renewable energy park with rows of solar panels and wind turbines (Stuti Mishra/The Independent)

Whales are now 'sharing' food amid shortages due to climate change

By Stuti Mishra

Climate change is threatening the future of Winter Olympics

By Stuti Mishra

Two-thirds of the US is facing drought in the middle of winter. Here's why scientists are worried

By Josh Marcus

Stuti's must-reads

Billions of people are facing the reality of irreversible water "bankruptcy", according to a stark warning from UN researchers.

The United Nations University Institute for Water, Environment and Health revealed on Tuesday that nearly three-quarters of the global population reside in nations deemed "water insecure" or "critically water insecure".

This crisis, stemming from decades of overuse and with dwindling natural supplies, means four billion individuals endure severe water scarcity for at least one month annually.

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Among the 26 executive orders issued by Donald Trump on the first day of his return to the White House — targeting everything from Diversity, Equity and Inclusion programs to the renaming of U.S. landmarks — there was one that had immediate, devastating consequences for hundreds of millions of people around the world.

"Reevaluating and Realigning United States Foreign Aid," signed on January 20 2025, ordered a 90-day pause in all United States foreign aid for the "assessment of programmatic efficiencies" and to ensure "consistency" with United States foreign policy.

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CLIMATE IN NUMBERS

3.2C

That's how much hotter Frbruary in Milan, the host of this year's winter Olympics is, on average, compared to 1956 when it first hosted the games

Read more

The Independent has launched a project to investigate the impact of foreign aid cuts on the developing world. The project receives funding from the Gates Foundation. All of the journalism is editorially independent.

FEATURED

The women in Syria defying violence – and Trump's aid cuts – to protect their families

By Jessie Williams

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