UP plans energy transition through biofuel and solar power

New Delhi: The Uttar Pradesh government on Friday outlined its plans for energy transition in the state, which will include building on existing renewable energy through bio fuel as well as solar energy. UP Minister of Energy and Urban Development, AK Sharma said that the state had recently announced a bio-fuel policy and a new solar energy policy is also in the pipeline.

“Uttar Pradesh has managed to meet the highest-ever demand for electricity in summer this year. I thank the Union Government and the Union Power Minister for supporting me in my efforts to get more coal for producing more power to meet the demand in UP this summer,” Sharma said.

The minister was attending a two-day conference of Power and New and Renewable Energy for ministers of states & UTs. The meet was organised at Udaipur by the Union Ministry of Power. Union Power Minister R K Singh as well as power ministers of several states and union territories attended the conference along with government officials and PSU functionaries.

Sharma elaborated that on his request the Union Power Minister and his team were ready to support the electrification of the remaining majras (sub-villages) in Uttar Pradesh. He pointed out that in the five-year tenure of CM Yogi Adityanath’s government, lakhs of majras had been given access to electricity. However, some are still pending. The proposal has been sent to the Centre for taking for taking them up under the RDSS scheme, he said.

The Union minister had also agreed to the UP government’s request for taking up underground cabling of electric lines in major cities and prominent tourist locations, Sharma said. He added that this would also help to reduce the losses incurred through damages to electric lines.

At the conference, Singh highlighted the achievements made in recent years in the power sector in terms of surplus generation capacity, development of a national grid, universal access to all households and improved power supply to rural areas.

The Union minister said that for the last 4-5 months, the demand for electricity kept growing at about 11%. But, the government managed to meet the demand, even at a time when there is a global energy crisis. He stressed that though coal prices had increased globally, but the Central government had managed to keep electricity prices under control to ease the burden on citizens.

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