A while ago TreeHugger wrote a compelling article on how India is committed to low carbon growth and energy sources. The local environment Minister, Mr. Jairam Ramesh stated in an interview given to Reuters :
“We will unilaterally, voluntarily, move on a low-carbon growth path. We can’t have 8-9% GDP growth and high-carbon growth. It has to be low-carbon growth...that is the objective that we have set for ourselves.”
CleanTechnica give us details on a massive $2.3 trillion dollar that will be invested by the country in energy. (Yes, that’s 1,600 billion euros).
Renewable energy and energy efficiency will be focus of India’s $2.3 trillion energy investment plan over the next two decades. The plan is aimed at achieving consistently high economic growth rates without having any net adverse impact in the environment.
While the exact proportion of the investment for renewable energy is not known yet, the countries planners have clean energy sources like solar, wind and hydro power in focus as the foundations of the new green economy.
(…) In addition to large-scale solar power plants, the government is also planning to promote small-scale solar power systems for commercial buildings and homes.Several state governments offer attractive subsidies to industries and homeowners to install solar panels and solar water heaters.
(…) Wind energy is the centerpiece of India’s renewable energy infrastructure. Although confined mainly to the coastal states, it makes up 70 percent of the installed clean energy generation capacity. It has been estimated that wind energy could meet almost 24 percent of India’s electricity demand by 2030.
On the latter point, I wrote last week that wind energy could bring a fifth of global electricity. I am glad to read it could do the same in India.
This happens as the country is now the third largest greenhouse gases emitter, with a share of five percent. China and the USA are first and second with around 22 percent each. Given the amounts of bright engineers in the country I am sure they will come with products that will revolutionize cleantech in the decades ahead.
For more on the $2.3 trillion plan, please refer to the Business Standard’s article.
The cleantech arms race now has a new contestant.
