In the context of India, energy access has remained a challenge, even though different governments ever since Independence have made enormous efforts in augmenting the same. Initial schemes did not clearly articulate the definition of village electrification, resulting in a lower level of household electrification, which got compounded due to lack of interest on the part of distribution utilities to maintain the service levels (due to sub-optimal loading and non-segregation of feeders). Similarly, usage of clean cooking gas was limited to urban areas, with a large number of rural people relying upon traditional biomass sources like cow dung and forest wood. India was thus, counted among the nations faring poorly in terms of providing energy access. Simultaneously, there has been the issue of climate change, as a substantial portion of Indian energy needs are being met using fossil fuels; it is counted among the top five nations globally in terms of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.

The ‘Saubhagya’ scheme, rolled out in the year 2017, has been a game-changer in terms of providing electricity connections; all villages have been electrified and over 25 million households have been connected to the power network. Similarly, the ‘Ujjwala’ scheme, launched a year before, has empowered rural women by facilitating cooking gas connections to over 60 million households.

The 25 million new power connections issued under the ‘Saubhagya’ scheme are expected to create an additional load of 4,800 MW, with 860 million units (MU) of monthly power requirement (considering 200 watts of load per household with six hours of usage). Experts anticipate a further increase in power consumption as new consumers experience electricity, using a higher number of appliances and for a longer time duration; analogy can be drawn with the telecom sector, which saw a surge in telecom density as well as usage of Internet services. The additional load can reach to 12,570 MW, while the monthly power requirement expanding threefold to 2,260 MU (considering 500 W loads operating for 7 hours, with 5 per cent addition in the number of households). This is equivalent to 2 per cent of the average monthly power generation in India, and as such, can be met by the existing assets; a mere 2 per cent increase in the plant load factor of coal power plants (totaling to 190 GW capacity), shall be sufficient to meet this new demand.

On the sustainability front, the Indian government has been making proactive efforts, which includes the deployment of renewable energy technologies like solar and wind. Largescale capacity addition of these technologies has happened across Indian states, with the total capacity reaching 75 GW, contributing over 10 per cent in the Indian grid. The government has made ambitious plans to increase this capacity to 175 GW, besides doubling its grid penetration, by the year 2022. The new demand, arising from the ‘Saubhagya’ scheme, can also be met by using renewable assets, which generated 8 billion units (BU) on a monthly average basis in the calendar year 2018.

However, there can be challenges on account of ‘time of use’ when solar and wind power are not available (say post-sunset hours and non-windy months). This may further nullify the locational advantage of solar and wind power plants, many of which are co-located in rural areas. Due to the limited success of non-electricity generating renewable schemes (like biogas), large-scale fuel switching due to ‘Ujjwala’ may increase GHG emissions, as the users shift from traditional biomass (considered to be GHG neutral) to gas (derived from fossil fuels).

Another issue is the concentration of solar and wind assets across certain areas within the country. This may create grid instability due to demand-supply mismatch, leading to power curtailment by the distribution utilities; a drop-in wind generation was observed during non-windy months (when compared between 2017 and 2018), even with a net addition of wind capacity. Another interesting trend is the preference being accorded to solar; the total quantum of wind and solar power generated in the country was found to be equal for the months which saw a fall in wind power generation for the period mentioned above.

Even with effective policy interventions undertaken in India towards the provision of energy access and clean energy by the successive governments, there has been a marked increase in the level of energy imports as well as GHG emissions, with the fossil fuel use remaining constant, since the last decade. In order to achieve SDG-7 goals, Indian energy policies need to be strategised and suitably contextualised across the different producer and consumer groups.

This can include increasing the market size of clean energy by aggregating demand both under the existing areas (agri-pumping, biogas, GDP growth) and creating new opportunities (space cooling, electric vehicles).

Renewables can provide the energy required to fuel the expanding Indian economy. About 70 BU of additional annual power requirement can be met by putting up 40 GW renewable assets (generating at 20 per cent capacity factor), enabling optimal utilization of upcoming solar and wind plants. This shall also ensure achieving the 175 GW renewable targets by the year 2022, though scheduling, storage and inter-state power transfer would be the pre-requisites for accommodating larger quantum of renewables. Promoting non-electric energy generation using renewable can further add to its attractiveness towards meet heating, cooling and cooking energy needs.

Fulfilment of sustainable development goals would require concerted efforts on the part of the stakeholder community, including policymakers, researchers, suppliers, project developers, utilities, financiers, entrepreneurs as well as the consumers.