Centre assures financial assistance to AP's ECM

Hyderabad, March 14 (INN): The Government of India has agreed in principle, to provide substantial financial assistance to the Andhra Pradesh Energy Conservation Mission for taking up extensive campaign on energy efficiency programmes in the State.

This was indicated by Dr Ajay Mathur, Director General of Bureau of Energy Efficiency (BEE), Ministry of Power, Government of India, in his interaction with AP Chief Secretary Dr I Y R Krishna Rao, who is also chairman of APSECM, during his recent visit to Hyderabad. The Director General requested the Chief Secretary to arrange to submit a report with detailed proposals on communication strategy of the energy conservation mission for the year 2015-16. He also requested a separate report on LED revolution in AP, which enables the union Govt. to showcase the same to other states in the country.

Dr Mathur was very much impressed with the strategies being adopted by the APSECM in creating wide-range of awareness among the people on energy conservation and efficiency measures in general and impact of LED revolution in particular. The proposed financial assistance would go a long way in taking the campaign forward on energy efficiency programmes such as Demand side Efficient Lighting Programme (DELP), energy efficient street lighting and Perform-Achieve-and-Trade (PAT) scheme for industries on a massive scale.

Dr Mathur recalled the remarks of Prime Minister Narendra Modi that 'one can establish and run a power station as big as a 4000 MW capacity plant, but it is difficult to conserve same amount of energy without the involvement and support of millions of people. If this trend of over-dependence on fossil fuel such as coal and natural gas is not arrested immediately, our future generations will get affected badly. Hence, educating people and creating much more awareness among them on the significance of energy conservation is the need of the hour for saving the precious energy for posterity. It is high time the nation seriously focuses on conserving energy, water and environment protection'.

Describing Andhra Pradesh as the best State in the country on implementing energy efficiency programmes, the Director General said AP was all set to become a role model in the country in this aspect. He said the communication strategy of APSECM on energy conservation was superb and could be showcased as a case study for other States in order to achieve energy savings. He further said: 'I put on record the valuable contribution of SECM, Government of AP in making all out efforts to co-ordinate, monitor and implement the EC&EE programmes and creation of much needed awareness on conservation of energy and judicious usage of precious natural resources for the benefit of present and future generations. I am really touched by its efforts.'

While thanking Director General, BEE, for his personal interest in overseeing the progress of EC& EE activities in AP, the Chief Secretary said energy conservation was one of the flagship programmes of Chief Minister. CS further stated that 24X7 ' Power For All ' a brain child of our Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu, to realize the vision of Navyandhra Pradesh by Providing quality, reliable and sustainable power to rural areas also even during summer season for the welfare of the people. To achieve this goal, the Govt. of AP emphasized on the following flagship programmes, i) Effective implementation of EC&EE programmes ii)Encouraging and integration of Renewable energy i.e. Solar and Wind etc. iii) reduction of T&D losses to single digit iv) optimization of thermal/hydel power generation.

The Chief Secretary, along with Director General/ BEE, Secretary Energy, I&I Ajay Jain and Chief Executive Officer of SECM A Chandra Sekhara Reddy released a special report on exclusive media coverage on Energy Conservation and Energy Efficiency activities taken up by the SECM/ Govt of AP from June 2014 to March 2015. The Chief Secretary appreciated the pro-active role of print and electronic media in popularising the EC&EE schemes taken up by SECM/ Govt. of AP and requested them to extend continued support for the noble cause of energy conservation as a social responsibility.

The Secretary, Energy, I&I, Ajay Jain, intimated during the meeting that EESL, MD, Saurabh Kumar communicated to Govt. that EESL will invest around Rs.1000 Crore exclusively on EC&EE programmes, which is the highest investments by EESL compare to any other state in the country. The Govt. sets target for distribution of 2 crore LED bulbs by March 2016.

Dr. Ajay Mathur, DG/BEE emphasized the need for SECM society, a State Designated Agency (SDA) that implementation of PAT scheme may be monitored periodically so that the benefits of the scheme for industrial sector are realized as per stipulated time frames. DG felt that with the pro-active industrial policy of state Govt., designated consumers of industries of AP have the capacity and capability to achieve global specific energy consumption norms.