An Indian power supplier is set to invest $1 billion (£600 million) in two wind and solar projects within the next five years.

The projects, expected to supply electricity to nine million households in India, will be built in the southern state of Karnataka.

The renewable energy company, Welspun Energy, has a goal to develop 1.7GW of wind and solar in India over the next few years.

Vineet Mittal, Co-founder & Managing Director of the company said: “We want to help create a greener empowered India and through our renewable energy projects Welspun Energy is effecting a change on the ground. With the signing of these two projects we have moved exponentially forward in this direction.”

Karnataka holds the third favorable position in the country for wind based power projects, according to Welspun and has the potential of 11,500MW wind energy capacity.