Solar energy for as low as Rs. 6 per unit could keep you cool during power cuts in the dog days of summer.
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The new and renewable energy ministry would be asking companies to provide home solar electrical systems in Delhi and offer 30% subsidy on the capital cost of installing the systems.
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A two-kilovolt (KV) solar system for homes costs around Rs. 1.80 lakh without subsidy, half the rate three years ago and enough to power a two-room house with one air-conditioner.
"It means that cost of each unit of power for the next 25 years would be Rs. 6 per unit - slightly higher than the per-unit cost of thermal electricity," said Tarun Kapoor, joint secretary and head of Jawaharlal Nehru Solar Mission in the ministry.Cost of a unit of power through Delhi discoms is about Rs. 4.5-5 per unit.
Rapid improvement in solar technology over the past few years has produced high-efficiency panels that generate more power in smaller space.
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A two-KV system would require about 200 square feet on the roof, the size of a drawing room in a DDA two-BHK home.
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A two-KV system would require about 200 square feet on the roof, the size of a drawing room in a DDA two-BHK home.
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Tapping the emerging potential of solar power, many top companies are now selling solar inverters, a smaller version of the home system.
Delhi has been slow in catching up with the solar revolution that has gripped many of the southern and western Indian states, which have almost same amount of good sunshine -about 10 months.
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.
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