India Announces Plan to Double the Investment in next 5 years in Clean Energy Research

Introduction

Union Minister for Science & Technology and Earth Sciences, Dr . Harsh Vardhan led the Indian delegation at the 7 th Clean Energy Ministerial ( CEM7 ) and the Inaugural Mission Innovation Meet at San Francisco, held on 1 st and 2 nd of June, 2016 . India has been a member of CEM since its inception and has joined 8 out of 13 CEM initiatives .

India is a Founding Member of the Steering Committee of the Mission Innovation and also a Member of the two sub-groups: Joint Research and Capacity Building and Private Sector Engagement. Department of Biotechnology under the Ministry of Science and Technology is coordinating the national efforts towards the Mission.

Dr. Harsh Vardhan, while making the Mission Innovation Announcement at the Ministerial Panel, stated that the Mission Innovation (MI) is the noblest mission which will help humanity in the future. It is an effort to accelerate public and private global clean energy innovation, pursuing the goals set during the COP21 in Paris . In order to achieve this goal, all the MI partner countries have a shared desire to enhance the pace of innovation and scale of transformation through this clean energy revolution. They released their respective governments ' plans to double clean energy research and development funding over the next five years .

Emphasizing upon India ' s commitment to pursue a green path to growth through research-led innovations, the Minister said that India ' s current investment in Clean Energy Research is about $72 million which is planned to be doubled to $145 million in the near future . He also made a Formal announcement on new joint collaborations with Mission Innovation Countries .

The Minister announced about expanding India ' s collaboration with UK by setting up a Joint Virtual Clean Energy Centre to address the challenges in solar energy and launching a new Research Track on Smart Energy Grids and Energy Storage under the Indo - US Partnership to Advance Clean Energy Research ( PACE - R ).

Dr . Harsh Vardhan also launched the Global Cooling Challenge at CEM7 . He noted that by accelerating the introduction of super - efficient air conditioners we can reduce the energy demand from 60 GW of energy to 40 GW, a saving of over 30 %. This translates to cost savings in consumer energy bills of $2 . 8 billion and GHG reductions of 20 million tons of CO 2 equivalent .

Showcasing India ' s achievements in the field of Clean Energy, the Minister informed the CEM members that India has successfully implemented the world ' s largest LED lighting programme . This programme has seen India lead the way by driving 12 % of global LED demand at present, up from 0 . 1 % a couple of years ago .

Source

Press Information Bureau , 03 June, 2016