Minister calls for more efficiency in energy consumption

Mumbai, May 3 (IANS) Union Power Minister Piyush Goyal on Wednesday called for bringing in more efficiency in energy consumption and said power consumption in the country is bound to increase in case of inefficiency.

"My job, as a responsible stakeholder in the market through the government, is to improve India's energy efficiency, to reduce consumption wherever it is wasteful. We are working towards the goal of power to all round the clock," said the Minister of State for Power, Coal, New and Renewable Energy and Mines.

He told BTVi in an interview that in the last three years, India's energy consumption grew by 6.5 per cent on a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) basis as against a CAGR of 6.15 per cent in the decade before that. This still does not factor in the huge growth in captive generation of power.

He said there was a transformational change in consumption in Uttar Pradesh in less than a month after Yogi Adityanath took charge as the Chief Minister.

"The consumption increased to 320 million units per day from 240 million units. The system could handle this kind of growth. In the past, we were so used to shortages and the whole system was despondent," Goyal said.

Talking of use of LED bulbs, Goyal said about 500 million LED bulbs have been sold in the last two years.

The Centre had launched the programme with an ambitious target to sell 770 million LED bulbs in about five years. "We never imagine it is going to be such a success; so much so that prices have fallen by over 85 per cent," Goyal added.