Aimed at helping farmers, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has asked the officials to give emphasis on ethanol blending in petrol and evolution of mechanisms.
The prime minister, who reviewed progress of key infrastructure sectors, including petroleum and natural gas, power, renewable energy and housing on Monday, advised the officials to expedite the setting up of second generation bio-ethanol refineries to utilise agricultural residues for this purpose.
Public sector oil marketing companies are supplying 4% ethanol blended petrol by procuring 120 crore litre of bio-fuel at present.
Currently, the bio-diesel and ethanol industry in India is worth Rs 6,000 crore, but it is expected to touch Rs 50,000 crore by 2022, based on the demand of petrol and diesel in the country. Modi had earlier said ethanol blending in petrol should be increased to 10% over time.
In the meeting, which was attended by officials from PMO, NITI Aayog and all infrastructure ministries, the power ministry officials said that the Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana has benefited 1.98 crore below poverty line (BPL) households so far. The contribution of gas to the primary energy mix has risen to
8% and 81 cities are being covered under City Gas Distribution networks.
Rural electrification
Under the rural electrification programme, electricity was provided to over 13,000 villages out of a total of 18,452 and process is on to provide electricity to remaining villages in the next 1,000 days.
Over 22 lakh rural BPL households were electrified in 2016-17, and over 40 crore LED bulbs were distributed in the same period.
Published 09 May 2017, 20:37 IST