Energy efficiency is a low-cost option to meet the growing energy demands: DG, Bureau of Energy Efficiency

Apr 11, 2024

NEW DELHI, 11 April 2024: Mr Abhay Bakre, Director General, Bureau of Energy Efficiency (BEE), Ministry of Power, Govt of India yesterday while addressing the stakeholder roundtable discussion on ‘Doubling the Rate of Energy Efficiency of Indian Industry 2030’, lauded the role played by FICCI in taking the National Energy Efficiency agenda and emphasized on the need for global level knowledge exchanges and sharing the success stories of other countries.

 

Mr Bakre also stressed the need for mapping the potential for Energy Efficiency improvement in different countries. He mentioned that energy efficiency is a low-cost option for meeting the growing energy demand as compared to other options.

 

Mr Venu Gopal Mothkoor, Senior Specialist- Energy NITI Aayog said that as we are progressing towards to become a developed country, India’s energy needs will increase by 2-2.5 times by 2047. He highlighted that about 84 per cent of the Indian energy is produced using fossil fuels and technology to become Net Zero are not available at the commercial level. Energy efficiency becomes important to achieve the CO2 emission targets, he added. Mr Gopal stated that by focusing on the energy efficiency and demand electrification (electricity coming from clean sources) alone has a potential to reduce 51 per cent of CO2 emissions by 2047 as compared to the baseline.

 

He further added that following areas need to be given thrust to double the rate of energy efficiency which include decarbonization, clean fuels (Green Hydrogen, bio-fuels etc.), digitalization, sustainable buildings, penetration of smart appliances and incentives.

 

Mr S P Garnaik, Country Representative India (In-Charge), Asia Regional Lead (Energy Efficiency), Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI) India said that energy efficiency needs National level programs similar to the PAT scheme. Speaking on the merits of the energy efficiency he added that about 30-40 per cent country’s carbon emissions targets to be achieved through energy efficiency.

 

In order to accelerate energy efficiency, Mr Garnaik emphasized to create conducive environment for technology adoption, financing and design National level programs for industries in the following key areas Waste Heat Recovery, Industrial pump replacement program, Motor replacement, Electrification of Industries and Digitalization and Smart Metering

 

Mr Arijit Sengupta, Director, Bureau of Energy Efficiency (BEE), Ministry of Power, Govt of India said that the government is targeting to reduce 686 million tons of CO2 by 2030 out of which 250 million tons of CO2 reduction is targeted from industries with specific focus on steel, cement, pulp & paper, petrochemical and aluminium. He mentioned that the Energy Conservation Act got amended in 2022 and government is working on India Carbon Market plan. Soon the Green Hydrogen consumption norms will be rolled out and the BEE is also working on ‘Carbon Intensity Targets’ to incentivize the energy efficiency efforts, he added.

 

The leading organizations including GGGI, IOCL, Tata Steel, NTPC, Shakti Foundation, Godrej, Devki Energy, Mitsubishi, Samsung, Forbes Marshall, CLASP, Haier, Schneider, Siemens, EESL, SIDBI, GIZ, Tata Capital, Vedanta and IIEC had fruitful deliberations on the way forward towards doubling the Industrial Energy Efficiency by 2030.

 

Mr Abhishek Gupta, Head-International Business, Energy Efficiency Services Limited, Govt of India talked about need for replicable models for Energy Efficiency programs like National Efficient Cooking Program (NECP), Clean Cooling, lighting program and national motor replacement program.

 

Mr Rajiv Kumar, General Manager, Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI) said that we can easily double the Energy Efficiency in MSME sector. They have created financing products in various area including solar rooftops, energy efficiency – machine upgradation, electric vehicles and waste minimization/waste to energy.