Shri M.Kannappan, Minister of State for Non-Conventional Energy
Sources, has said that the government would endeavour to add 10,000
MW from renewables to the power generating capacity and electrify
18,000 remote villages through renewables in the next ten years.
He was speaking at a Workshop on ‘Wind Power in India – Approaches
and Prospects’ as part of the United Nations Conference on Climate
Change (COP – 8). However, the continued and long-term development
of this sector, and realisation of the goals, necessarily demands
a formal policy and legislative framework. This exercise is now
underway. A Renewable Energy Policy Statement has been prepared,
and we have also proposed incorporation of suitable enabling provisions
in the Draft Electricity Bill for the accelerated development
of this sector has also been proposed, he added. Shri Kannappan
said export of wind turbines and their components has also commenced.
India has the innate potential and capacity to emerge as a major
hub for production and export of wind turbine equipment and technical
services in Asia and the Pacific region. The Minister said that
with declining cost trends and increase in the scale of wind turbine
manufacturing, wind promises to become a major power source globally
during the next two decades.
The Wind Power Programme in India was initiated in the mid-80s,
and a market-oriented strategy was adopted from the very inception,
which has led to successful commercial development of this technology.
Government has taken several initiatives to accelerate the pace
of wind power development which include expansion of the wind
resource data base, technical improvements, testing, utility scale
installations and enlargement of the user profile to encompass
large corporate users.
