India and its Renewable Energy Goals

First thing what is renewable energy? Any sustainable energy source that comes from natural environment is known as renewable energy. Major renewable energy sources in the world are-

• Hydro energy
• Wind energy- Fastest growing renewable energy source.
• Solar energy
• Biomass energy
• Tidal energy
• Geothermal energy
• Wave energy
• Biofuel

India is blessed with an abundance of sunlight, water and biomass. The Indian economy is experiencing tremendous growth over the past several years. For the economy to continue this trajectory, India needs to address its energy challenges across all sectors.

India has abundant, untapped renewable energy resources including a large land mass that receives the highest solar irradiance of 5 trillion kWh/yr, a large coastline of 7500 Kms for realising on-shore & offshore wind potential, significant annual production of biomass, and numerous rivers and waterways having immense potential for developing hydropower.

Some interesting facts about renewable energy sources in India:-

• India is the 4th largest country with regard to installed power generation capacity in the field of renewable energy sources.
• India ranks 5th in the world with a total wind power capacity if 1080MW out of which 1025Mwhaev been established in commercial projects.
• India has the world’s largest program for renewable energy.
• In the world’s sixth largest energy consuming nation.
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Major Goals set by India :-

• The Indian government has now set a bold short-term target under which it will aim to add 17GW of renewable energy generation capacity in the next six years.
• The country’s electricity demand is expected to nearly double by 2017.
• Tata, India’s largest energy utility, is looking to add more than 150MW of wind energy to its portfolio and increase its production of solar energy by ten times its current levels, the Wall Street Journal reported earlier this year.
• According to the federal government’s plans at the start of this year, the country was aiming to develop 20GW of solar power alone by 2022, ten per cent of which would include off-grid distributed solar capacity.
• In order to provide cooking energy in rural areas, 4.27 million family size biogas plants are currently installed in India and by 2022 additional 2 million plants are planned. A pilot project has been launched to test the efficiency and marketability of improved community size cook stoves.
• hydropower projects with a capacity of over 2,700 MW have been set up in the country, and projects for about 900 MW are in various stages of implementation. The aim is to double the current growth rate, and take it to a capacity addition of 500 MW per year in next two-three years.

The goal, set by India’s National Action Plan on Climate Change (NAPCC), calls for meeting 10 percent of the nation’s energy needs with renewable energy.

Vernel King of Free Green Concepts a social networking community dedicated to educating the consumer market about the uses of renewable energy technologies and services. Join The Conversation - Join The Movement. http://freegreenconcepts.com