As summer looms, India orders coal power plants to max out
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Coal and oil-fired generators will be maxed out for the entire summer, which will significantly increase India’s already sky-high greenhouse gas emissions.
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Smoke rises from a coal-powered steel plant at Hehal village near Ranchi, in the eastern state of Jharkhand, Sept. 26, 2021 (AP Photo/Altaf Qadri, File)
The Indian government has for the second consecutive year directed the country's coal-fired power plants to run at full power. The government’s order is this year even more sweeping than last year’s; from April through June, all coal and oil-fired generators will be maxed out for the entire summer. According to analysts, this will significantly increase India’s already sky-high greenhouse gas emissions.
Kakali Halder, a 48-year-old, knows why the order has been issued. She was the secretary of a group of several hundred seamstresses who fabricate clothing items and share the profits between them, and they have struggled daily over part of last year’s sweltering summer to get orders out when they cannot depend on the electricity. They lost power almost every day, despite being close to the megacity of Kolkata. The machines would stop, delaying the work on the uniforms they were on contract to deliver.
“Sometimes there were power cuts for up to 12 hours. We had to use the manual tailoring machines and stitch with our hands,” said Halder. The power cuts made them lose money and put extra effort and time to finish work that would need half the time.
Cooling systems -- more urgently necessary across the country today as climate change turns up the heat on the already sweltering temperatures -- were exhausting the grid. The regular power outages hit several northern states, including West Bengal, Gujara, and Rajasthan. The order to keep the coal plants running is one example of a warming planet requiring action that further aggravates climate change.
World’s third-largest emitter of GHGs
India is the second-largest country in the world by population and the third-largest emitter of GHGs. It depends on its abundant coal, with some imports, for about 70% of electricity. The country has hundreds of coal-fired plants and mines. Power demand is expected to reach a high of 229 gigawatts in the coming month.
India “has to ensure there is energy security as this is critical for the country’s development and growth,” Alok Kumar, the most senior official in India’s federal power ministry, said, adding that the country is meeting its climate goals fully and will not stop.
Some believe that national politics are influencing the call to run the generating stations at full power for summer. The politically important southern Indian state of Karnataka will see major regional elections on May 10, while national elections to choose a new prime minister will be held next year.
“There is a strong political incentive to ensure regular electricity supply this summer,” said Aditya Lolla, an energy policy analyst at Ember, a London-based energy think tank.
Election results in India are significantly affected by electricity availability and electricity subsidies, and incumbent political parties strive to provide an incessant supply, especially when elections are around the corner.
This February, India’s power consumption increased by 10% compared to last. In the coming weeks, records could be broken.
The country today meets about 10% of its power need with renewable energy. While there is fast growth in clean energy, it is far from being close enough to meet peak demand.
Read: India provides 80 million rural households with tap water
Experts agree that what is needed is a massive amount of new energy storage, usually large arrays of batteries, which charge from excess power on the grid during hours when demand is low. Today, India has only gigawatts that serve about 3 million homes a year.
“Energy storage is important to ensure uninterrupted supply during extreme weather as well as to shift firmly towards clean energy,” said Ammu Jacob, a scientist at the think tank Center of Study of Science, Technology, and Policy.
Without more storage, Jacob added, it will be more difficult to integrate wind and solar energy into the grid, even with new renewable energy projects, because of its intermittency.
Building out storage is costly, Jacob said, but costs are coming down. The alternative is costly too, as it damages lives and livelihoods due to extreme weather caused by climate change.
To accelerate India’s energy transition, “international climate finance is essential,” said Lolla of Ember.
The country will need to install more than 40 gigawatts of clean energy on average every year to reach its 2030 goal. However, a parallel plan to phase down coal-fired power will also be needed, Lolla added.
India has announced a net zero target for 2070, but the road to getting it is still unclear, Lolla said. The country fell just shy in 2022 of meeting its target of 175 gigawatts of renewable energy.
For people like Kakali Halder, the more urgent hope now is that last year’s power cuts do not return.
“All our customers are local and they understand if orders are delayed, but at the same time no one waits forever,” she said.
