A 1987-batch IAS of Jharkand cadre, Indu Shekhar Chaturvedi will replace Anand Kumar who has been assigned the Ministry of Culture.

The subsidies to renewable energy went from a high of Rs 15,313 crore in FY2017 to Rs 9,930 crore in FY2019. At the same time, government subsidies for oil and gas went up from Rs 40,762 crore in FY2017 to Rs 67,679 crore in FY2019. Unprecedented resource crunch post-Covid-19, however, presents a good opportunity for the government to rein in specific fossil fuel subsidies while creating more fiscal room for promoting renewables and other welfare schemes—according to a new report by the International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD) and the Council on Energy, Environment and Water (CEEW).

Bids can now be submitted till May 29 for supply and installation of the inverter-transformer package for the power generator’s Solapur solar project in the state of Maharashtra.

The sodium-ion battery technology developer has bagged its first order from ICM Australia and is looking at India as the next destination for manufacturing with the initial target set as 1 GWh.

Given Covid-19 spread, India’s ministry has decided to conduct the third Global Renewable Energy Investors Meet and exposition (3rd RE-Invest)—scheduled from October 15 to 17—on a digital platform. The ministry has sought proposals for an interactive IT platform to facilitate the same.

Distributed generation with battery storage can revolutionize solar development in India in the shortest time period with minimal investment.

June 3 is the last date to submit bids for installation and commissioning of the NTPC Solapur solar project tendered under the domestic content requirement category. Major items including modules and inverters for the project shall be provided by NTPC to the EPC contractor.

A blanket extension equivalent to the period of lockdown and additional 30 days for normalisation after the end of the lockdown is allowed for completion of solar projects.

Indian scientists have developed a low-cost electrocatalyst based on iron, manganese and N-doped carbon derived from fish gills (Fe/Mn/N-FGC) that increased the performance of a homemade rechargeable zinc-air battery when used as the air cathode. The Fe/Mn/N-FGC cathode based battery achieved open-circuit voltage of 1.41 V and a large power density of 220 mW/cm2 at 260 mA/cm2 current density—compared to commercial platinum/carbon based battery’s 1.40 V and 158 mW/cm2—with almost stable charge-discharge voltage plateaus at high current density. 

The draft Electricity Bill 2020 moves us with a toolbox of structural reforms, towards not only efficient but also a progressive electricity market.