Amitabh Kant, the CEO of NITI Aayog (National Institution for Transforming India), which is a sustainable development policy think tank of the Government of India, recently put forward his perspective on India’s energy landscape over the coming decades, which is nothing short of impressive. He touched upon various important topics as the advancement of solar, wind, storage, EVs etc in India. I was very happy to read his viewpoints on the sustainable and renewable energy development in India. He spoke practically and clearly about how the country should act smartly in order to become a much cleaner place for our future generation.

Few important pointers from his excerpts are:

i) The whole transformation into electric vehicles should take place gradually and in a steady manner so as to not adversely affect the auto manufacturing industry which is the bread and butter for lakhs of people working in this sector. He very practically explains that the cost of EVs is still high for a price-sensitive Indian market, where only 20 out of 1000 odd Indians own a car. So in order for the transformation to be successful, the cost of electric vehicles should become on par with the conventional cars which is expected to happen around 2026.

Read the List Of Best Electric Cars Running In India

ii) India is expected to run majorly on renewable energy by 2050. On the popularity of coal, Mr. Kant commented that if the cost of renewables falls sharply, there will be a major shift towards renewables. The two main challenges he pointed in this regard are energy storage and grid management. Market forces and economics will play an important role to decide the fate of renewable energy in India.

iii) The most impressive thing he pointed out was that the Indian solar manufacturers need to be more competitive in order to survive and become popular globally.

“I am not a great believer in protectionism. I am a believer in globalisation” – said Mr. Kant.

This somewhere also surfaces his thoughts towards the ongoing debate on safeguard duty imposition on solar imports in India. The manufacturing industry in India has to be globally competitive before seeking protection. The country has set huge renewable energy targets and it might make more sense for India to adopt the foreign technology and move forward rather than save the interests of a handful few.

iv) The future policies on battery manufacturing should be based upon shared, connected and zero emission considerations. Cost of battery needs to fall in order to encourage mass adoption of batteries and increase domestic manufacturing. Also, new materials for battery manufacturing should be studied upon and implemented rather than just focusing on lithium.

v) He also pointed towards the creation of a national DISCOM. Private players should enter the power grid sector to encourage healthy competition and technological improvements, and run electricity as a great business.

vi) Lastly, he emphasized using electric vehicles in India in order to reduce air pollution (14 of our cities are the worst in the world). Mr. Kant gave a good idea about implementing clean kilometers rather than owning electric vehicles in the first place.

You can read the full excerpt here: Economic Times

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