Prime Minister Narendra Modi addressed the World Environment Day event, jointly organized by the Ministry of Petroleum & Natural Gas and the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change today through a video conference. During the event the PM interacted with a farmer from Pune who shared his experience of organic farming and use of biofuel in agriculture.
The Prime Minister released the “Report of the Expert Committee on Road Map for ethanol blending in India 2020-2025”. He also launched the ambitious E-100 pilot project in Pune for the production and distribution of ethanol across the country. The theme for this year’s event is ‘promotion of biofuels for a better environment’. Union Cabinet Ministers Nitin Gadkari, Narendra Singh Tomar, Prakash Javadekar, Piyush Goyal and Dharmendra Pradhan were also present on the occasion.
Speaking on the occasion, the Prime Minister said that India has taken another leap by releasing a detailed roadmap for the development of the ethanol sector on the occasion of World Environment Day. He said that ethanol has become one of the major priorities of 21st century India. He added that the focus on ethanol is having a better impact on the environment as well as on the lives of farmers. He said that the Government has resolved to meet the target of 20 percent ethanol blending in petrol by 2025.
He noted India has been included in the top 10 countries of the world in the Climate Change Performance Index. He added that India is also aware of the challenges that are being faced due to climate change and is also working actively.
The Prime Minister spoke about the hard and soft approaches taken to fight climate change. On the hard approach, he noted that our capacity for renewable energy has increased by more than 250 percent in the last 6-7 years. India is today among the top 5 countries of the world in terms of installed renewable energy capacity. Especially the capacity of solar energy has increased by about 15 times in the last 6 years.
The Prime Minister said that today, a large part of the country’s railway network has been electrified. Airports of the country are also made to use electricity from solar energy at a rapid pace.
The Prime Minister spoke about a project which is underway to develop Kevadiya as an electric vehicle city. He said necessary infrastructure is being made available so that only battery based buses, two-wheeler, four-wheeler will run in Kevadiya in future.
