GE has released its position that India can make substantive reductions in emissions from the power sector through accelerated and strategic deployment of renewables and gas power.
The position paper advocates and outlines policy actions that can help India to chart a unique path to a cleaner economy with affordable, reliable and sustainable power for all.
Fossil-fuel dominance
India is facing significant environmental challenges owing to the emissions from the power sector, dominated by fossil fuel-based power generation. The power sector in India accounts for 49 per cent of total CO2 emissions, compared to the global average of 41 per cent. On the other hand, the electricity demand in India is expected to grow at CAGR of 5 per cent between 2018 and 2040. It’s critical to urgently adopt cleaner powering technologies at scale that can complement each other and act as growth levers towards creating sustainable power generation mix.
Paradigm shift
“India’s strategy to move towards using low to zero carbon fuels for electricity generation is bringing a paradigm shift in the energy space in the region as well as globally. However, the country’s plan to provide round-the-clock power for all in the backdrop of the growing renewable energy (RE) baseis facing challenges such as intermittency of renewable power, low-capacity utilization of transmission system and grid firming requirements as RE achieves scale in the coming decades. This is leading to – renewables curtailment. There is an urgent need to meet the flexibility requirements of the power system operation, providing adequate base-load power and reliability of electricity supply.” said Deepesh Nanda, CEO, GE Gas Power South Asia.
GE’s position paper may be downloaded here (external link)
Developing gas-based power
The position paper presents a scenario wherein gas-fired power plants, that can be developed quickly, taking significantly less space and at scale, are available regardless of the time of day or weather conditions, providing dependable capacity as long as needed, whether for minutes, hours, days or weeks at a time. Emission compliant and flexible gas-based power generation, with its quick start up, deeper turn down levels and faster ramp rates is a key enabler to integrate more renewables into the National Grid and meet seasonal and peak power demand.
Round-the-clock power
Based on a study of the Indian power sector and GE’s global experience, GE makes key recommendations in the position paper with respect to the round-the-clock power plan. These recommendations if implemented can support adoption of advanced gas turbine technology capable of using blends of natural gas and hydrogen to generate lower carbon electricity, provide level playing field to gas power plant owners in the market, streamline electricity dispatch mechanism based on merit-order, emission norms and flexible operations, and fast-track development of the ecosystem and necessary infrastructure to support future electricity growth curve in India.
Also read: GE To Supply 810 Mw Of Wind Turbines To JSW Energy
Green hydrogen
As India embarks on its journey to become global hub for green hydrogen, GE believes hydrogen to bea key focus area having major role play in power generation. With its history of running gas turbines burning lower carbon fuels (including some in India), GE is well-positioned to support the utilization of hydrogen in gas turbine assets. In India, GE Gas Power has a significant installed base of over around 260 utility and industrial gas turbines across both government and private sector power plants.
Featured photograph shows a GE gas turbine (Photo: GE)
