Growth of wind power hinges on policy support
Green power is the need of the hour and wind power fits into the scheme of India's power requirement and meet the local and global economic concern, said Mr. Girish R. Tanti, director, Suzlon Energy Ltd. at the international seminar on 'Green Power 2002' in Chennai.
He said that the world markets were either environment-driven or energy-driven. He said that it is ironical that the top four countries with the highest installed capacities, Germany, the US, Spain and Denmark, were all environment-driven. Wind had been the major contributor in the renewable sector, mainly owing to its economical viability on large scale. The forecast for capacity generation in wind energy sector world over in the year 2001 was 6,225 MW while only 4,821 MW was added. Forecast for the year 2002 stands at 6,885 MW. And the total installed capacity is expected to cross 50,000 MW by 2005.
He said that India once held the third place in terms of installed capacity and in spite of growing supply-demand gap has been gradually slipping down in its position.
India's share of the world market for new capacity addition in the year 2000 was only 3.7 per cent. In 2001, it had dropped below 2.5 per cent. The cumulative installed capacity in India till 2000 was held at 6.6 per cent of the world installation, which slipped to 6.2 per cent in 2001.
For the 10th Plan, India's goal for wind energy is around 6000 MW. He said that although the forecast says that the market will grow steadily in the coming years, this would greatly depend on the establishment of favourable policies at the state and Central level. To achieve this target the renewable energy programme needs support from associated market players like the investors, manufacturers, financial institutions, government and most importantly SEBs and utilities.
He said that the consistent growth in Europe has primarily been due to the growing awareness. Awareness of the environmental degradation with very sustainability of the human kind in mind and the rising demand of energy has prompted most of the advanced countries to take on wind energy as a serious answer to these questions.
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