Utility-level storage is the key to energy efficiency

Society should take initiatives to shift towards a sustainable and clean future through energy conservation and efficient recycling solutions, says Shirish Garud, Director – Renewable Energy Technology, TERI. India plans to conserve 820 gigawatts of electricity producing capacity by 2030.

How do you see this in practice?
The availability of affordable and reliable electricity has been an important requirement for the development of any country. In recent decades, India has improved in this area, with connectivity rising and electrical shortages
decreasing. To make it sustainable and achieve India’s climate targets, decarbonising energy generation is a major problem. With the aim of generating 175 GW of renewable capacity in 2022 and 450 GW of renewable capacity by 2030, India has begun one of the world’s most ambitious renewable energy programmes. A collaborative platform between
important stakeholders and a comprehensive, in-depth analysis adapted to the conditions of the Indian energy sector are required for the achievement of this goal. The Energy Transitions Commission plans to double it in the next six to eight years, so it is ambitious, but it is entirely dependent on economic growth as well as demand in the residential sector, which is undoubtedly growing due to changing lifestyles in which people seek digitalisation and modern technologies such as electrical gadgets, but a major demand should come from the industrial and commercial or building sector.

What techniques are required to maintain power plant efficiency and to meet the ever-increasing energy demand?
The power plants are powerful, the control of power plants is going to be an important challenge. There are two major challenges is more and more renewables coming in because 60 gigawatts of coal power might be added in the next eight years, and the other is that the majority of power will come from renewables. This variable renewable power will have to be tackled with a battery or other storage technologies like pumped hydro storage or gravity storage or some other new technologies. Another thing, the coal power plants will have advanced control mechanisms for quick ramping. Furthermore, they can also be achieved through power when the government is trying to restart the gas pipelines with a follow-up capacity of about 25 Giga or 25 / 26k or aspirants stagnant because of the high cost of debt. Multiple strategies will be required to plan and operations need to be modernised with advanced metering and more monitoring and control systems, SCADA systems. It is challenging, but at the same time we are capable of overcoming it.

What difficulties do utilities face in maintaining energy efficiency and protecting power plants?

Advertising