India’s per capita electricity consumption touches 1010 kWh
In an indication of growing appetite for electricity in India, the country’s per capita electricity consumption has reached 1010 kilowatt-hour (kWh) in 2014-15, compared with 957 kWh in 2013-14 and 914.41 kWh in 2012-13, according to the Central Electricity Authority (CEA), India’s apex power sector planning body. “The per capita electricity consumption reached 1010 kWh some time back,” said a senior government official, requesting anonymity. But experts are far from enthused from the increasing consumption figure. “Per capita electricity consumption crossing 1,000 units a year is certainly a milestone, but without much significance. One-fourth of the households in the country still have no access to electricity, with some states in East and North East having less than even 30% households with (electricity) access. Most significant milestone that the nation must achieve is 100% households having 24×7 quality supply of electricity,” said Debasish Mishra, senior director, consulting, Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu India Pvt. Ltd. India’s per capita power consumption is among the lowest in the world. Around 280 million people in the country do not have access to electricity. In comparison, China has a per capita consumption of 4,000kWh, with developed nations averaging around 15,000kWh per capita. Interestingly, while the peak shortage in the country was at 2.3% in May, many believe that the demand still looks artificially suppressed as state electricity boards (SEBs) are not buying power. SEBs have been unwilling to procure electricity because of their weak financials due to low tariffs, slow progress in reducing losses, higher power purchase costs and crippling debt. India has an installed power generation capacity of 272,503MW. A power ministry spokesperson didn’t immediately respond to queries emailed on Sunday. Meanwhile, minister for power, coal and renewable energy Piyush Goyal has maintained that the states have not been buying power. “Some state governments haven’t cooperated as much as they should… we urge them to increase it. Otherwise they would receive an appropriate response from the electorate in the coming days,” Goyal said at a press conference on 25 May. Electricity generation was the silver lining in the May index of industrial production data. Electricity output, which contracted 0.5% in April, recovered to grow 6% in May. “Of our installed capacity, only around 145,000MW is operational. While the supply curve is evident, where is the demand curve?” asked the official quoted above. India needs as much as $200 billion to meet its target of installing 100,000MW of solar power capacity and around 60,000MW of wind power capacity by 2022. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) had made energy security a part of its election campaign for the April-May 2014 general election. After assuming office in May, the BJP-led government launched a scheme aimed at ensuring about eight hours of quality power supply to agricultural consumers and 24-hour electricity to households. Gilbert Perreault Womens Jersey
Essar Power’s 2×600 MW Mahan plant plans to commission second unit by Q4 of FY2016-17
Essar Power MP Ltd (EPMPL), a subsidiary of Essar Power Ltd, plans to commence commercial operations from its second 600 MW unit at its 2×600 MW Mahan power project in Madhya Pradesh’s Singrauli district from Q4 of FY2016-17. Mahan’s Unit 1 began commercial operations in April 2013 but had to suspend generation because of the cancellation of the captive coal block by the Honourable Supreme Court, and the subsequent non-availability of coal. The Company restarted operations in May this year—following a gap of 19 months—after securing coal through government conducted special forward e-auctions. Until date, the Company has secured 22 lakh tonnes of coal through the auction route at a consideration of about Rs660 crore. In the coal block auctions conducted in 2015, EPMPL won a captive mine in Tokisud in Jharkhand state. Essar has invested over Rs 13,000 crore in the 1,200 MW Mahan plant and development of Transmission network connecting Mahan plant to National Grid, which requires an estimated 5.5 million tonnes of domestic coal per year. Of this, 2.32 million tonnes is likely to be supplied every year from the Tokisud block, which has estimated reserves of 52 million tonnes, and is expected to commence operations in 2017. EPMPL has long-term power purchase agreements with Essar Steel and the MP Government. It is trying to tie up its full capacity through additional long- and medium-term PPAs. Mr MK Sharma, COO, EPMPL: “The availability of coal throughgovernment conducted auctions has breathed new life into our project.We are currently operating Unit 1 close to full load and are confident of starting of generation from Unit 2 in next 6 months.” Mr KVB Reddy, CEO, Essar Power Ltd, said: “With a total investment of Rs 30,000 crore, Essar Power has a goal of attaining a generation capacity of 6,100 MW from its eight plants. The start of generation from the second unit will be an important milestone which shall enhance the business operating capacity to 4900 MW and would mean the completion of capex cycle for the Power Business apart from Tori project which shall be completed in FY 18-19. This shall also result in sustainable cash generation for the business and improve its ability to meet various creditor liabilities going forward.” Ryan Griffin Womens Jersey
Railways to run passenger trains on LNG, cut diesel costs by 20%
Brace for a pollution-free train ride soon. Indian Railways has decided to move towards using Liquefied Natural Gas, commonly called LNG, to run its passenger trains, converting all its exiting locomotives into dual-fuel based. The driving power cars, which so far have been using diesel as its fuel, would now be retro-fitted to use LNG as well, for the first time, sources said. The aim is to cut down on diesel consumption by 20%. To achieve this, the locomotives have to be overhauled with enhanced safety features as LNG is a hazardous inflammable fuel, sources in Railway Board said. The development comes at a time when petroleum prices are now on an uptrend with most oil marketing companies raising retail prices of diesel by as much as Rs 1.80 a litre beginning this week. In contrast, use of LNG would mean significant savings for the Railways as the country has recently renegotiated a long-term deal with Petronet LNG Ltd in December reworking a 25-year contract with Qatar’s RasGas Co, resulting in prices dropping by almost half. Indian Railways has firmed up the plan under which it would convert existing and new driving power cars of diesel-run trains, called DEMUs into dual-fuel system. Initially, all Cummins 1400 HP engines would be taken up for conversion, which are either new or freshly-overhauled engines done after 18,000 hours of run. Since LNG is seen as a highly hazardous material, safety has to be uppermost in the mind of the manufacturers, sources said. The converted driving power cars should have safety and protection features for engines and manufacturers should demonstrate its safe and trouble-free field operation. The system offered should also have suitable safety devices for the safe operation of LNG storage, which can only be sourced from manufacturers having a minimum three years’ experience in manufacturing and supply of such LNG tank systems. Retro-fitting the LNG tank has to be carefully done as it has to be mounted on a moving platform moving at high speed, needing automatic safety system and alarm with manual override systems, Indian Railways documents mentioned. Indian Railways have been toying with the idea of using alternative environment-friendly fuel to partially replace diesel that runs its locomotives. Use of Compressed Natural Gas as an alternate fuel has been experimented upon on DEMU engines to see the environmental impact and studies by Research Design and Standard Organisation, the R&D wing of the Railways, showed 30% savings in operation and maintenance cost of about Rs 27 lakh per engine per year. However, using LNG is more economical for commercial operations. Beau Bennett Authentic Jersey
OMCs eye over 50% of retail sales in cashless mode by March
Bharat Petroleum on Monday said cashless transactions at its outlets have jumped to 26% after November 8 when high value notes were banned, from 10% time before and expects at least half of all transactions to turn cashless by March. Retail sale of oil products — petrol, diesel, CNG/PNG and LPG — in volume terms account for around 7.3 trillion transactions per annum, according to BPCL. “We hope by end March, all the state-run oil marketers expect over 50% of the retail transactions to be in cashless mode carried out through loyalty cards, debit/credit, e-wallets, or even NEFT etc. After the demonetization announcement on November 8, non-cash payments have crossed 26% at our pumps,” BPCL executive director (retail) George Paul said here today. Towards achieving this target, BPCL today tied up with SBI, HDFC Bank, and some other major banks to install PoS terminals apart from joining hands with Paytm, FreeCharge, Oxigen, Reliance Jio, SBI Buddy, and Fino for enabling mobile-wallet transactions at its retail outlets. Paul said the three state-run oil marketing companies together have 5,3000 pumps and over 78,000 LPG agencies. These outlets together clock daily transactions worth Rs 500 crore (petrol), Rs 450 crore (diesel & CNG) and Rs 50 crore (LPG), which in volume terms work out to be 7.2-7.3 trillion transactions per day. Before the noteban, BPCL was doing only around 10% daily transactions cashless across the country, which was worth only Rs 50 crore. In Maharashtra, the share of cashless transaction is close to 23.75% for all OMCs, Paul said, adding in Mumbai, 54.53% of transactions at its retail outlets are cashless. Across the state, the cashless transaction for BPCL is around 32% of its total sales, he added. BPCL has installed PoS machines at all its filling stations in Mumbai, Navi Mumbai, Thane and Raigad district, Paul said. He also said since the pumps were allowed to dispense cash, over 3,000 pumps together have distributed around Rs 155 crore to customers since the note ban announcement. Derek MacKenzie Authentic Jersey
India leads Spain, UK in wind energy generation; affordable solar panels could cause a clean energy boom
Renewable energy is an area that is expected to take off in India, thanks to the ambitious mission stated by the Ministry of New and Renewable energy. It states, “24×7 affordable environment friendly power for all by 2019.” The government also plans to generate around 40 percent of its power from non-fossil fuels by 2030. With the electronics market projected to grow at a compounded annual growth rate of 24.4 percent between 2012-2020 and expected to reach $400bn by 2022, it is only natural that we started looking at fossil-free sources of energy. India’s per capita energy consumption has seen sustained increase over the years (from 734kWh in 2008-09 to 1075 kWh in 2015-16), but it is still the lowest among the BRICS nations. With the whole push towards putting India on the digital highway, our energy infrastructure backbone has to grow proportionately. Investing and accelerating the dependence of renewable energy source is definitely deemed to play a major role in this. Did you know, India is at the fourth position in terms of installed wind power capacity, ahead of Spain, UK, France, Canada. As on 31 October, 2016, Solar Energy Projects with an aggregate capacity of over 8727.62 MW have been installed in the country. India’s total solar capacity is 10GW and the government plans to take it to 17GW by 31 March 2017. Here are the targets of the government for renewable energy generation for the next three years. Source 2016-17 2017-18 2018-19 Solar Power 12,000 15,000 16,000 Wind 4000 4600 5200 Biomass 500 750 850 SHP 225 100 100 Grand Total 16725* 20450* 22150* * Capacity in Mega Watts (Source: Press Information Bureau) Thanks to the hot weather in majority of the Indian landscape, we are in a position of advantage as far as generating solar energy is concerned. That a relatively cooler country such as Germany can generate over 35GW of solar energy, should give us enough confidence to achieve the numbers the government is looking at. Just last month, news emerged that India has the largest solar power plant at a single location (Kamuthi, Tamil Nadu) with a capacity of 648MW – which has the capacity to power 150,000 homes. In order to achieve these targets, solar panels installed capacity has to see a boost in numbers. We will need many Kamuthi-like examples across the country. A new report by the World Economic Forum (WEF) could certainly push the investments in solar energy. According to the report, solar and wind energy generation has reached the same price point or is cheaper than new fossil fuel capacity in over 30 countries. Michael Drexler, leading infrastructure and development investing at WEF has said in a statement that investing in solar and wind is not only commercially viable, but a compelling investment with long term returns. According to the WEF report, there are more political barriers rather than economic ones. “Contracts are not standardized, regulatory uncertainty remains, and financial institutions have not created an asset class with a public, standardized track record that will reassure mainstream investors,” says the report. Challenges faced One of the main challenge which is stopping solar energy generation from taking off in India has been the costs associated with solar photovoltaics, when compared to those associated with other energy generation methods (read fossil-fuel based ones). With the WEF report hinting a drop in prices, this issue should not be that great a challenge going forward. Economies of scale, innovations in technology and dropping equipment prices should bring in some correction here. Land acquisition is another concern, considering a 1MW of solar power generation requires around 5 acres of land. The government is trying to overcome this issue by earmarking dedicated solar parks across the country. “34 Solar Parks of capacity 20,000 MW in 21 states have been sanctioned which are under various stages of execution,” says an MNRE report. Evacuation of the generated solar energy is another challenge. According to this report in Livemint, Power Grid Corporation of India has been asked to have separate transmission lines to evacuate green energy. While initially there will only by inter-state transmission lines, local government are expected to distribute the energy inside their respective states. As mentioned before, the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy has ambitious plans. All that’s needed is a focussed approach towards overcoming the challenges mentioned above. Calle Rosen Womens Jersey
India keeping away from CORSIA a major concern: IATA
Expressing disappointment over India not being part of the global pact to reduce emission in the aviation sector, global airlines grouping IATA has said it will be a “major concern” for Indian operators, but hoped that the country would join the framework in coming years. The Carbon Offsetting and Reporting Scheme for International Aviation (CORSIA) was agreed upon earlier this year under the aegis of ICAO. “The point on which we are disappointed… is that India didnt draw into CORSIA agreement,” IATA Director General and CEO Alexandre de Juniac said even as he expressed hope that India would join the scheme. In a recent interview to PTI, Juniac said CORSIA would not be a major disruption in terms of competition for airlines operating to and from India since it is not a route-based system. “But it is a major concern for Indian operators not to be able to contribute to the carbon neutral growth or reduction in CO2 emission in the next 30 years,” he noted. CORSIA, which seeks to reduce emission in the aviation sector by way of carbon offsetting mechanism, is to be implemented in five phases. The scheme is to run from 2021 to 2035. Shane Prince Authentic Jersey
Pune Airport To Boast NewTerminal Building
Pune Airport is set to have a new terminal replete with high-tech infrastructural facilities. The move comes after the Airport Authority of India (AAI) approved plans to build a new building for a terminal under the expansion scheme. Speaking about the development plans, Ajay Kumar, director Pune Airport, told Mirror, “The AAI approval came through only earlier this month. The AAI has sanctioned Rs 408 crore for the new terminal building. The new building, equipped with high-tech infrastructure, will be built in a 35,000 square metres space. Work will begin in the new financial year, which is April 2017 and we will try to finish before the end of 2019.” On May 15, 2016, the Ministry of Defence (MoD) had allotted 15.84 acres of land under the air force to Pune airport on a 30-year lease. Curley Culp Womens Jersey
Government to airlines: use Gagan GPS or face consequences
The government has warned domestic airlines of `consequences’ if they did not adopt the Rs 774 crore GPS-Aided Geo Aug mented Navigation system. The warning came during a meeting called by the DGCA earlier this week with all stakeholders, including the airlines, who have not availed of the system even 18 months after its launch.Jointly developed by Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) and Airports Authority of India (AAI), at an investment of Rs 774 crore, the GAGAN system was officially launched by Civil Aviation Minister Ashok Gajapathi Raju in July last year. It is said to make airline operations more efficient and cut down costs as it reduces separation between aircraft, increases air safety and fuel efficiency. The National Civil Aviation Policy, announced by the government in June, makes it mandatory for all aircraft registered in India from January 1, 2019 to be GAGAN-enabled. A notice issued by the DGCA dated December 19 stated that most aircraft registered in India are still not equipped with this technology. “This assumes significance as many airlines and operators have placed orders for many more aircraft which may not be equipped with necessary airborne equipment and thus not be GAGANcompliant,” DGCA director general B S Bhullar said. However, in order for the domestic airlines to availing of the GAGAN system, they would have to make their aircraft GAGAN-compliant, which would entail a huge investment on their part. Lamin Barrow Jersey
Something is lacking, Raju tells Air India staff
Sending out a stern message to Air India staff, Civil Aviation Minister Ashok Gajapathi Raju said something is lacking when it comes to commitment shown by them, compared with rival airlines. While acknowledging that Air India, which turned operationally profitable last fiscal, has “done better”, the Minister emphasised on the need to ensure more cohesiveness at the national carrier. Raju, who has been generally supportive of Air India, is of the view that the carrier has definitely done better but there is always scope for improvement. “The cohesiveness still has to be built in (at Air India)…you have the advantage of different types of airlines, competition is there,” Raju said in an interview. “Commitment shown by some of their staff and the commitment shown by Air India staff — there is still something lagging.” It is a good airline and has served the country well, he noted, but “see, everywhere job is assured if that institution is there. If the institution goes, what happens to your job?” “Everyone will wish them well. Its financial books are bad and it needs to improve on. They have to develop strategies. They are on the right track,” he added. Vincent Taylor Authentic Jersey
Abertis buys two Macquarie toll road assets for Rs1,000 crore
Spanish infrastructure firm Abertis Infraestructuras SA has agreed to buy two operational toll road assets in south India from Macquarie Group Ltd for about Rs1,000 crore, said two people familiar with the development. Abertis has signed a share purchase agreement to buy the two build, operate and transfer (BOT) toll roads, the Farukhnagar-Jadcherla highway in Andhra Pradesh and the Trichy Tollways project in Tamil Nadu, the two said on condition of anonymity as the talks are private. Abertis’s bid beat an offer ranging between Rs700 crore and Rs800 crore for the two assets made by Tata Realty and Infrastructure Ltd (TRIL), one of the two people cited above said. Mint first reported in June that Macquarie will sell its stakes in the two operational toll roads as it tries to deliver returns to its investors. For Abertis, which is in the business of constructing, operating and maintaining toll-based highways, the deal in India would throw open a high-growth infrastructure market. The government had targeted awarding 25,000km of road projects in the current fiscal year, accelerating the construction of roads in an attempt to improve connectivity. An Abertis spokesperson declined to comment, citing confidentiality agreements. Macquarie also declined to comment. TRIL did not respond to a query emailed on Thursday. Selling operational road assets allows debt-ridden developers to reduce debt, private equity investors to offer returns to their investors, and long-term investors—such as pension funds—to buy revenue-yielding assets. “We see the current environment as highly conducive for consolidation in the BOT space. With interest rates coming down and traffic growth picking up, we expect a surge in demand from developers/investors looking to acquire operational BOT projects with healthy financials,” PhillipCapital analyst Vibhor Singhal wrote in a 7 December report. In 2009, Macquarie started its first infrastructure fund in India along with the State Bank of India, called the Macquarie-SBI Infrastructure Fund (MSIF). The fund, which planned to raise $3 billion, aimed at investing in infrastructure projects. SBI and Macquarie also jointly operate a domestic investment entity, SBI-Macquarie Infrastructure Trust (SMIT). Britton Colquitt Jersey