Raise the green flag

Indias commitment to ramping up renewable energy may take concrete shape,as states might be required to allocate part of their power supply from renewable sources. We know that it is urgent to switch to cleaner energy,but on the other hand,these are several times as expensive as conventional power. Wind-farms require large amounts of land; solar-cell manufacturing is chemically intensive; nuclear energy comes with safety and security concerns. All these alternatives being currently bandied about come with certain costs.

Given the size at which we are growing,it is essential to make a rapid and radical shift away from fossil fuels. But pre-selecting and mandating an energy mix might not be the answer,and the only realistic way of squaring that dilemma is disruptive technology. India is rightly focused on bringing down solar energy costs and developing technologies to produce biomass-based energy from plant and animal waste. In other countries,large utility-scale renewable energy offers important economies of scale. In Denmark,industrial-scale wind farms already supply 20 per cent of the countrys power; Germany and other European countries are not far behind. In India,a renewable purchase obligation could definitely spur investment in green energy infrastructure.

But we need to dedicate the full gamut of creative research,technologies and policies to this cause instead of easy fixes like an ethanol crusade. India recently became the 77th country to join the International Renewable Energy Agency,which specialises in sharing such inventive solutions. Even if fuel prices arent holding a cocked gun at the planet,this energy project cannot be put on hold a project that should be,in Thomas Friedmans words the biggest single peacetime project humankind will have ever undertaken.