Home › Policy › Environment › Climate Change and Energy

In India, Starving for Energy

Co-host: The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI)

Share

Indian coal miners push a trolley laden with coal inside an underground tunnel of a mine at Godavarikhani, July 27, 2007. (NOAH SEELAM/AFP/Getty Images)
enlarge image

Indian coal miners push a trolley laden with coal inside an underground tunnel of a mine at Godavarikhani, July 27, 2007. (NOAH SEELAM/AFP/Getty Images)

Co-host: The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI)
MUMBAI, May 11, 2007 - While India's economy has been growing at around 9% a year, energy production has managed only 5% annual growth, said Pramit Pal Chaudhuri, the Asia Society's 2007 Bernard Schwartz Fellow, at the Society's Mumbai Center. India is faced with a serious policy challenge as a result of this discrepancy, and a recent report issued by India's Integrated Energy Committee warned that the country needs to produce five to seven times more energy than present levels to satisfy future demand.

Much of the discussion in the media has focused on India's external energy policy, such as with the nuclear deal it has been negotiating with the United States. Chaudhuri stressed, however, that progress on domestic reforms is much more important in terms of meeting India's growing energy needs. Coal, for example, makes up more than half of India's energy production, but the coal industry in India, Chaudhuri warned, is corrupt and inefficient. New exploration for coal deposits in India hasn't taken place since the end of British colonial rule, leading to an extraordinary amount of coal being stolen. Without improvements in governance in the coal industry and more technological progress in this sector, India will continue to be a net importer of coal -- despite sitting on the fourth largest coal reserves in the world. Chaudhuri also evaluated India's energy security policy in the context of China's own strategy for securing energy.

R. K. Batra, Distinguished Fellow at TERI, moderated this discussion.

Yukti Garg | 01:12:10 12:41am
Hi, I am writing from Terra Green, a monthly magazine published by Teri Press, the publishing arm of Teri(The Energy and Resources Institute). We would like to use the above photograph for an article on coal mining that we would be featuring in our forthcoming issue. We would appreciate if you could grant us the permission of usage and could send us the high-resolution photograph at 300dpi. We will provide credits. Looking forward to your reply. Regards, Yukti Garg Image Editor Teri Press email : ygarg@teri.res.in

Post new comment

Your comments are welcome, please adhere to our guidelines

Be respectful. Personal attacks will not be tolerated; nor will profane, abusive or threatening posts.

Keep it short (150 words or less), Stay on topic.

Asia Society reserves the right to moderate all comments and remove or edit for guideline violations. Thank you.

The content of this field is kept private and will not be shown publicly.
Type the characters you see in this picture. (verify using audio)
Type the characters you see in the picture above; if you can't read them, submit the form and a new image will be generated. Not case sensitive.