Reliance Industries (RIL) has decided to withdraw the scheme to merge its wholly-owned subsidiary, Reliance New Energy (RNEL), with itself as it feels that the renewable energy business should be undertaken by the subsidiary, the company said in an exchange filing.
“Based on a review of the new energy/renewable energy business and investment structure, the Board, at its meeting held on April 21, 2023, has decided that the new energy/renewable energy business should be undertaken through RNEL and the scheme be withdrawn,” the filing said.
Last May, the company had said RNEL would be amalgamated as the renewable energy initiatives would be undertaken by RIL directly.
In the exchange filing, RIL said: “This is further to our disclosure dated May 6, 2022, wherein we had informed that the Board of the Company had approved the Scheme of Amalgamation of RNEL with the Company and their respective shareholders (Scheme) under Sections 230 to 232 and other applicable provisions of the Companies Act, 2013 with an objective to undertake new energy/renewable energy business directly by the company.”
The scheme is presently pending with the National Company Law Tribunal, Mumbai Bench, for approval.
In 2021, Mukesh Ambani, in the annual general meet, had charted a massive investment of Rs 75,000 crore in green energy over a period of three years. Of this, Rs 60,000 crore was going to be spent on setting up four giga factories at Jamnagar.
These include solar manufacturing units, a battery factory for energy storage, a fuel cell-making factory and an electrolyser unit to produce green hydrogen.
“The age of fossil fuels, which powered economic growth globally for nearly three centuries, cannot continue much longer,” he said. Another Rs 15,000 crore was to be spent on developing the value chain, and partnerships.
In the annual report for FY22, Ambani said the new energy business had the potential to overtake other businesses of the group in the next five-seven years.