Conference on Distributed Renewable Energy for Sustainable Development

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Power Foundation of India organized a conference on “Distributed Renewable Energy for Sustainable Development” in New Delhi, on 27th February 2024. The Conference was organized in collaboration with Climate Policy Initiative.

The Conference brought together key stakeholders from the Government, Private and Public sectors, and policy think tanks. Notable participants included Bhupinder Singh Bhalla, Secretary, Ministry of New and Renewable Energy, S C L Das, Secretary, Ministry of Micro, Small & Medium Enterprises, Gurdeep Singh, CMD, NTPC and Dr. Tripta Thakur, Director General, National Power Training Institute (NPTI).

Rural India presents very distinct challenges to those encountered in concentrated urban and industrialized clusters and is critical to India’s decarbonization efforts. Recognizing the significance of rural areas, the conference emphasized the importance of decentralized, community-driven, and localized solutions, particularly Distributed Renewable Energy (DRE) projects. The conference shed light on the critical role of DRE in India’s decarbonization efforts, identifying impediments and advocating policy actions for broader adoption.

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Sanjiv Nandan Sahai, Director General, Power Foundation of India, said, “The implementation of DRE projects holds the promise of expediting India’s renewable energy advancement due to their shorter turnaround time. DRE projects harness biomass, solar, and
hybrid sources, presenting significant potential. Their application extends to benefitting Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) and small Commercial and Industrial (C&I) consumers.”
Dr. Dhruba Purkayastha, Director, Climate Policy Initiative, added, “India’s path to green economic growth is pivoted on the collective ability to unlock the huge potential of distributed RE (DRE) in India. By leveraging the power of innovation in terms of falling RE+ storage costs, fostering collaboration across diverse stakeholders, and implementing suitable policy and regulatory interventions, we can create a resilient, equitable, and low carbon distributed clean energy ecosystem for the underserved segments.”
During the day-long Conference, there were four panel discussions.

I. Role of DRE in India’s Sustainable Development
II. Empowering Communities – The role of Distributed Renewable Energy in Sustainable
Development
III. Uptake of DRE solutions for the MSME sector
IV. Business Models including Financing DRE

The conference delved into the intricacies of DRE projects, exploring their potential to curb energy losses, enhance livelihoods, and foster environmentally conscious manufacturing. Despite successful models in rural India, scaling up remains a challenge, necessitating the identification of impediments and advocating policy actions for broader adoption. The conference was a significant step toward fostering knowledge exchange, raising awareness, and proposing practical solutions for the broader adoption of Distributed Renewable Energy in India’s energy transition and sustainable development journey.

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Power Foundation of India is a think-tank and a policy advocacy body in the Power Sector. It is a society under the aegis of Ministry of Power, Government of India. It is supported by twelve leading public sector power sector organisations.