India has been taking significant steps to achieve sustainable energy development and has been investing in a variety of measures, from increasing capacity of renewable energy in the energy mix to increasing efficiency of energy utilization, while simultaneously working towards ensuring universal access to electricity and clean cooking fuels. However, the NITI Aayog has also stated that coal will remain a dominant source of energy for the foreseeable future. Could you tell us about how do you see the energy portfolio evolving?
As of now, in the overall energy basket, the share of coal is about 47%, oil about 32%, gas about 6.5%, and balance is renewable and clean energy. NITI Aayog carried out modelling exercises with India Energy Security Scenario (IESS), 2047, and under different build-up scenarios, it has been observed that coal will remain a major occupier of the overall energy basket, with a range of 37–40%. Oil will reduce from 32% to 22–23%. The share of gas will go up significantly as we are investing a huge sum of money in building up infrastructure and creating pipelines, shifting some of the heavy transportation system to LNG, and expanding the city gas distribution network. In the Northeast region, a lot of pipeline infrastructure is coming up. All this will increase the gas share in the overall economy from around 6% to 13% by 2030 as per our estimates. Renewables will increase. They are currently around 2–3% and will go to around 10% of the overall energy basket. Biomass will be around 12–13% because we are now focusing on CBG (compressed biogas) and bioethanol to address the issue of stubble burning.
Could you also talk a little about what do you see specifically as the role technology will play in energy transitions?
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