NEW DELHI, June 13 (UPI) -- One of the few countries in the world with a Ministry of Non-Conventional Energy Sources, India is using its natural resources and making strides toward developing advanced technologies for the energy sector.
"Currently India has an institutional capacity of 125,000 megawatts -- including thermal, hydropower, nuclear power and renewable energies," said U.N. Panjiar, additional secretary to the Indian Ministry of Power.
The country faces an average energy shortage of about 8 percent -- and a peak shortage of about 12 percent.
"The energy sector is the buzzword nowadays," Sudhir Mohan, an adviser in the Ministry of Non-Conventional Energy Sources, told United Press International.
Under India's Electricity Act of 2003, which lays down the framework of the power sector's development, the country announced its National Electricity Policy in 2005. This is aimed at ensuring availability of electricity resources to all areas. Among other guidelines, the policy requires government entities to development the power system based on optimal use of alternative resources.
"The Ministry of Non-Conventional Energy aims at adding about 5,000 megawatts in renewables," Panjiar said. "This level of capacity addition should take care of the shortfalls in the country by 2012."
While the Ministry of Power is working to eliminate all energy shortages by this time, the Ministry of Non-Conventional Energy also aims at 100 percent Remote Village Electrification by 2009.
Mohan said that this is important because many of the remote villages under this scheme are unlikely to receive grid-connectivity to energy resources because of high costs and the level of difficulty in doing this. As a result, villagers are being taught to use environmental resources for optimal power.
"Under the rural electrification program, we have 60,000 villages; currently 10,000 remain unelectrified," Mohan said. "At least 10 percent of total households in each village or hamlet must be electrified."
About 65 percent of rural Indian households are without electricity.
Apart from the specific Remote Village Electrification program, the Indian government is keen to advance technologies using natural resources: wind, biomass and solar energies being the most commercial.
Ranking fourth in the world for wind power -- after Germany, Spain and the United States -- India has an installed capacity of 4,434 MW. According to the Ministry of Non-Conventional Energies, the country's wind power potential has been assessed at around 45,000 MW, assuming 3 percent land availability for wind farms.
Through investment by the private sector, "people are paying money, getting machinery installed and being connected to the grids," Mohan said. The rates for wind power are like those for typical utilities -- on a 10-15 year agreement plan, users are typically paying about 3 rupees per unit of electrification (about 6 cents).
Machinery for hydropower mechanisms are being produced in India, with some components being imported from Scandinavia. Additionally, the export of wind turbines and components is expected to reach an estimated $65 billion in 2006.
Small hydropower stations, based mainly in the northern mountainous states, have been in action for almost 50 years. These generate about 500MW from streams.
Biomass programs use forestry material and animal waste for biogas generation -- the waste organic materials are fermented and generate usable methane gas. After China, India is the largest user of this form of energy.
"This is mainly used in villages; we have been promoting it mainly for cooking gas because otherwise villagers cut down trees for their cooking requirements," Mohan said. Crop residues also form an aspect of producing energy under the biomass program.
With the highest cattle population in the world, numbers ranking at about 310 million, the government has instituted the Natural Biogas and Manure Management Program as a part of its rural energy programs, using biomass techniques to produce energy from cattle dung.
Sunshine has encouraged solar energy use. The most common of these applications are the thermal water heating systems found more in the temperate climes of south and central India. But these have yet to become popular, due to the lack of incentives for funding expensive solar water heaters.
Although research is ongoing to develop solar technology further, the solar photovoltaic route is being used in greater capacity to generate light for telecommunications and railway signals, and even to operate water pumps in remote areas.
Solar photovoltaic is classified by the direct conversion of solar energy to power. "SPV cannot be bought unless the government subsidizes it, because the government feels that it is good for the people, good for the country," Mohan said
Photovoltaic capacity is ranked at about 70MW per year, mainly used for domestic applications in the hinterlands.
As photovoltaic technology comes at a high cost, the Indian government has worked out financial incentives "to bridge the gap between economic and independent financial viabilities," Mohan said. The government generally gives incentives of about 7 to 30 percent of system costs, and has an annual expenditure of $10 million.
"We have opened up a lot of solar power shops in villages -- given subsidy and incentives to people to set these up," he said. According to Mohan, there are about 250 of these shops in the country.
The government has gone to great lengths to promote alternative energy use. Hindi-language advertising is on bus stops in cities, signs promoting alternative energies are visible all over New Delhi and novel means of promotion for villages have been introduced. Solar-powered cooking contests have been fairly popular, Mohan said.
"This technology is bound to come to the cities because we don't have much conventional energy and resources are limited," he said. "The sooner we'll be able to develop better technology, alternative energies will become more attractive."
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