Centre bets big on solar, wind energy to meet power demand

The Centre is expecting to increase the share of renewable energy to the total energy requirement of the country to reach 15 per cent in the next five years, New and Renewable Energy Secretary Upendra Tripathy said.

He said at the recently held RE- Invest 2015, first Renewable Energy Global Investors' Meet, 293 firms have come forward to invest in solar and wind energy to generate 266,000 MW energey  in the next five years. The bankers have promised to finance the generation of 76,000 MW renewable energy. The energy department will take these firms to every state and provide a platform for them to interate with the state government, and bankers. Accordingly,  they will be taken to Punjab, then Andhra Pradesh. The present share of the renewable energy to the energy requirement is 6.9 per cent.

Tripathy said there is a need for renewable energy plan for each district and an executive engineer needs to be redesignated.

Earlier, speaking at the meeting, he said he was surprised to see the change in skyline of Mangaluru in the last 32 years.  Sitting in the DC’s office on Friday, he could easily remember his stint as a young Assistant Commissioner at Puttur in 1982.

He said he feels nostalgic when he visited the district after such a long time. The Mangaluru City has changed from green canopy of coconut trees to concrete buildings. The area where Circuit House was situated was more of a clam place unlike today’s busy road.  It was a different return to the root from where he started his career, for this top bureaucrat. As planned by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, all secretary-level officers working with the central government have been asked to visit their first place of posting to review its progress. Secretaries of various department and cabinet secretaries will be submitting a detail reports to the Prime Minister’s Office on how their first place of posting fared in development over a period of time.

He said during his tenure as AC, he had to tackle “Kyasanur Forest Disease (KFD) in Belthangady. In fact, on many occasion, even the schools and panchayat buildings were converted into hospitals to treat the patients. I am happy to note that Kyasanur Forest Disease (KFD) has reduced drastically in the district.”

There was progress in road and connectivity, agriculture and income of villagers, including per capita income and so on. After visiting Pilikula Nisargadhama on the outskirts of the City, he said that it is an asset to the district with six lakh visitors visiting the place annually. When asked on communal flare ups that have increased in the last few years, he said “we used to conduct peace meetings even then. However, if any problem arised, then former ZP president Sankappa Rai and former Member of the Legislative Assembly Ram Bhat would forget all their differences and come together to solve the problem.”

Tripathy later visited Puttur AC’s office, taluk panchayat office and met few of the leaders. He will visit gram panchayat office in Uppinangady, Taluk offie in Belthangady  and Sullia on Saturday.

Sustainable energy
Tripathy said that there is a need to chalk out a plan to promote sustainable energy like solar energy in Pilikula Nisargadhama. 

Speaking at a meeting at the DC’s office, he said that there is a need to create a corpus fund of Rs 30 crore to the Nisargadhama and use the interest from the corpus fund for the development.

He asked Mescom MD Chikkananjappa to promote solar energy in IP sets and roof top solar panel in the district. Even the hostels run by the social welfare and BCM departments can harness solar energy for lighting and cooking purpose. The excess share of the energy can be sold to the grid, he added.