Renewable Energy Potential

According to energy experts, India’s non- conventional energy potential is estimated at about 1, 95,000 MW. An estimate of 31 per cent of this potential comes from sun, 30 per cent from ocean-thermal, 26 per cent from bio-fuel and 13 per cent from wind.

During the last two decades, several renewable energy technologies have been developed and deployed in villages and cities. Some of the achievements are given in Table$$$ along with the estimated potential:

Table 1.3.1 : Renewable Energy Potential and Achievements:

Source/System ApproximatePotential Achievements (as on 31 March 2004)

A. Power from Renewables

1. Solar Photovoltaic Power — 2.54 MW

2. Wind Power 45,000 MW 2,483.00 MW

3. Small Hydro Power (upto 25 MW) 15,000 MW 1,601.62 MW

4.

Little to No Global Warming Emissions

Human activity is overloading our atmosphere with carbon dioxide and other global warming emissions, which trap heat, steadily drive up the planet’s temperature, and create significant and harmful impacts on our health, our environment, and our climate.

Electricity production accounts for more than one-third of U.S. global warming emissions, with the majority generated by coal-fired power plants, which produce approximately 25 percent of total U.S. global warming emissions; natural gas-fired power plants produce 6 percent of total emissions [1, 2]. In contrast, most renewable energy sources produce little to no global warming emissions.

According to data aggregated by the International Panel on Climate Change, life-cycle global warming emissions associated with renewable energy—including manufacturing, installation, operation and maintenance, and dismantling and decommissioning—are minimal

Since renewable energies do not result in carbon dioxide emissions, they offer a feasible solution to the problem that is faced widely.

5. Their low degree of emission results in cleaner air.

All of the chemical byproducts and substances that are released into the air by the processing and burning of fossil fuels like coal, petrol , ultimately affects the air that we breathe. Renewable energy source is a crucial step toward a less polluted environment.

6. They increase our energy security.

The effective use of alternate energy sources makes us less reliant on the import of fuels, which further more makes our vulnerability to the ups and down of the market and the influences of continuously changing political landscape to a minimal level.

7. Reducing the necessity of oil drilling.

New drilling prospects exists as of now, but many of them involve further more despoiling of several of the natural wilderness areas that we’re left with.

8. They provide financial stability to the