First in-depth review of India’s energy policies by IEA

Source: PIB

In partnership with NITI Aayog, International Energy Agency (IEA) released the first in-depth review of India’s energy policies

About the IEA report

The report highlights the achievements of India’s energy policies and provides recommendations to support the government’s goals of promoting well-functioning energy markets and boosting the deployment of renewables.
IEA regularly conducts in-depth reviews of energy policies for its member and association countries. This is the first review carried out for India, which has been an IEA-association country since March 2017.

Key findings of the report

Appreciation of India’s energy policies: The IEA report appreciates the Indian government on its outstanding achievements in extending citizens’ access to electricity, affordable efficient lighting, and clean cooking in record time through historic schemes like SAUBHAGYA, UJALA, and UJJWALA while pursuing energy market reforms and the swift deployment of renewable technologies.
Status of renewable energy sources of India: The report highlights the strong growth of renewables in India, which now accounts for almost 23% of the country’s total installed capacity.
The review also found that energy efficiency improvements in India avoided 15% of additional energy demand, oil and gas imports, and air pollution as well as 300 million tonnes of CO2 emissions between 2000 and 2018.
Energy demand: The country’s demand for energy is set to double by 2040, and its electricity demand may triple, according to the IEA report. It also mentioned that Indian oil consumption is expected to grow faster than that of any other major economy. This makes further improving energy security a key priority for India’s economy.

Recommendations of the report

The report offers a wide range of recommendations for reforms in support of India’s goal of promoting open and well-functioning energy markets in sectors such as coal, gas, and electricity. These include ;
1. Building strong regulators to ensure non-discriminatory access
2. Moving from state allocation to market pricing, and
3. Further rationalizing energy subsidies.
It stated that NITI Aayog can play a strong role in working with the states to implement power sector reforms, advance grid integration, improve flexibility and coordinate energy policy decisions.
The review also strongly encourages India to institutionalize energy policy coordination across the government with a national energy policy framework.

Significance of the report

The report will help India to design implementation strategies to achieve secure and sustainable energy access for its citizens.