The Climate Parliament has formed a Renewable Energy Task Group in the Indian Parliament to promote the development of solar, wind, hydro and biomass energy both at a large scale and at the village level.

The aim is to create a strong cross-party legislators’ network which takes action both inside and outside of the Indian Parliament/ State Legislature in order to press for necessary legislative, policy and administrative reforms that accelerate India’s progress on a low-carbon economy path.

Work is currently focusing on two issues:

Infrastructure

There is a need to create a reliable infrastructure for electricity generation and distribution.

India’s enormous renewable energy resources can meet future demand and can do so with a high degree of reliability.

With 300 clear sunny days and a high degree of solar insolation, most parts of India are suitable for solar power generation. Similarly, non-solar RE sources, like wind in coastal areas, biomass in the North East and the plains, and small hydro in the hills have an enormous untapped potential of more than 85,000 MW.

The Nehru Solar Mission and the Renewable Energy Certificate mechanism have kick-started the process, but efforts are piecemeal because of the absence of a comprehensive policy on renewables.

This needs to change. Infrastructure needs to be built to connect the diverse renewable resources. Procedures related to power generation and grid connection need to be simplified.

Only if legislators address these issues will the private sector have sufficient confidence to invest in the sector.

Mandatory Targets

There is a need to mandate the share of renewables as a percentage of total electricity consumption.

The 2008 National Action Plan for Climate Change (NAPCC) suggested an annual 1% increase in renewables’ share of total electricity consumption in India  for the next 10 years - implying a 15% total share by 2020. But the Plan provided no roadmap or strategy to make this happen.

In July 2009, the actual share was only 3.5% of the total - less than the NAPCC estimate - and the share of renewables may actually decline because of the proposed construction and extension of fossil-fuel based plants.

The Ministry of New & Renewable Energy have since 2005 attempted to draft a renewables policy but have not succeeded primarily because of lack of political will. Too often renewables are viewed as small scale, costly, intermittent and unreliable.

The Climate Parliament will support the Ministry in its attempts to secure an effective draft policy.