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India to be world 3rd largest energy consumer by 2020

Power Minister Sushilkumar Shinde has said that India is projected to become the world's third-largest energy consumer by 2020 after the US and China.

Speaking at the World Energy Leaders Summit in Istanbul, Mr Shinde said India has conducive policy environment as well as regulatory framework for securing a sustainable energy future.

Noting that energy requirement is expected to increase in the coming years, Mr Shinde said India is projected to become third-largest energy consumer in the world by 2020. He said that a two-pronged strategy has been adopted to meet this challenge. It would look at augmenting domestic supply sources including renewable energy apart from focusing on demand-side management and energy efficiency measures.

Domestic capacities for building power plants with super critical and ultra-super critical technologies are also being established to reduce dependency on coal for power generation.

Mr Shinde said that international players such as Mitsubishi, Toshiba, Hitachi, Alstom and Ansaldo have already started the process of partnering with Indian manufacturers to set up super critical manufacturing facilities in India.

The fast-growing Indian economy is grappling with acute power shortage. Estimates show that to achieve an economic growth of 9%, the country's energy supply would need to rise 6.5% annually.