Towards a green future: renewable options for a cleaner environment / by Bhaskar Natarajan and M. Satyanarayana

India-Canada Environment Facility (ICEF) was set up under a Memorandum of Understanding between the Governments of India and Canada with the mandate of enhancing the capacity of Indian organizations to undertake environmentally sustainable development and management of land, water and energy resources and providing support for programmes that specifically address the inter-relationship between poverty and environmental degradation

Renewable energy has made significant inroads in the Indian energy scenario. However, the actual achievements are a small fraction of the potential that exists for renewable energy in the country. The Central and State Governments have initiated a number of programmes to increase the pace of adoption of renewable energy. ICEF has supported projects on renewable energy in some of the remote parts of the country to contribute to these efforts. These projects have shown remarkable success in providing electricity and other energy services to the people in these remote areas. The local people have also been trained to mange these systems and they have, till date, proved that they can take control and manage these services.

AS ICEF draws to a close in December 2007, this booklet is part of the series to share the lessons from ICE projects with a view to enabling institutions to move forward with renewable energy projects across the country. ICEF has partnered with local NGOs, Central and State Governments and with other donor agencies for implementation of the projects. The case studies presented in this bookler will thus be highly beneficial for institutions and individuals working in the area of renewable energy