India a fast growing renewable energy country

India is among the fastest growing renewable energy countries in the world after China, Brazil and United States, said a UN report on green economy released on Wednesday.

Updated on: Nov 16, 2011, 21:40:32 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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India is among the fastest growing renewable energy countries in the world after China, Brazil and United States, said a UN report on green economy released on Wednesday.

“The investments in renewable energy in emerging economies have grown rapidly since 2005,” said United Nations Environment Programme flagship report before the meeting of global environment leaders on new green economy norms at Rio de Janeiro in June next year.

Investment from countries such as India, China and Brazil has increased by five times between 2005 and 2010 and it surpassed that of the developed countries in 2010.

“The total installed capacity of renewable of developing countries can be higher than that of the developed world,” the report said, adding that India, China and Brazil account for 90 percent of the new investments in the developing countries.

Overall, the investment for harnessing green energy through renewable increased from US $55 billion in 2005 to US $211 billion in 2010.

The report, which says governments are taking steps for inclusive low carbon economy, pointed out that India’s share of renewable in its total energy generation would rise from present 4.9 % to 6.2 percent by 2035. India can generate 10,000 MW of power from wind turbines and another 20,000 MW from solar power plants.

But, the UN report claims that India had not done well in adopting green norms in agriculture and said most of the farmer suicide cases are in areas under inorganic farming and where Genetically Modified crops are in use. “Organic farming in India has caused less stress,” the report said.

India’s bid to increase agriculture productivity through subsidies has done more harm than good to the environment.

“Experience is now showing that these (electricity) subsidies encourage farmers to pump much more water than otherwise would be the case and, as a result, water levels in 18 of Punjab’s 20 districts are falling rapidly,” the report said, adding that scrapping environmentally bad subsidies has not found political approval.

The report based on three year research also says adopting green norms could mean loss of jobs in sectors such as fisheries but new jobs will be created in low carbon growth sectors such as renewable and green agriculture.

But, the overall transition to a green economy would realize per capita incomes higher than under current economic models, while reducing the ecological footprint by nearly 50 per cent in 2050, as compared to business-as-usual, the report said.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
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.Read More

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