14-Dec-2022: Centre encouraging sugar mills to divert excess sugarcane to ethanol
The Union Minister of State for Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution, Ms. Sadhvi Niranjan Jyoti in a written reply to a question in Lok Sabha today shared that in a normal sugar season, production of sugar is around 320-360 Lakh Metric Tonne (LMT) as against the domestic consumption of 260 LMT which used to result in huge carry over stock of sugar with mills. This excess stock used to lead to blockage of funds & affected the liquidity of sugar mills resulting in delayed payment of cane dues & resulting in accumulation of cane arrears. In order to find a long term solution to address the problem of excess sugar, Government is encouraging sugar mills to divert excess sugarcane to ethanol. Government has fixed target of 20% blending of fuel grade ethanol with petrol by 2025. In sugar seasons 2018-19, 2019-20, 2020-21& 2021-22 about 3.37, 9.26, 22 & 36 LMT of sugar respectively has been diverted to ethanol. In current sugar season 2022-23, about 45-50 LMT of excess sugar is targeted to be diverted to ethanol. By 2025, it is targeted to divert 60 LMT of excess sugar to ethanol, which would solve the problem of high inventories of sugar, improve liquidity of mills thereby help in timely payment of cane dues of farmers.
Also, with a view to improve the liquidity position of sugar mills and to enable them to make timely payment of cane dues of farmers, Central Government had taken various measures viz. extended assistance to sugar mills to facilitate export of sugar; extended assistance to mills for maintaining buffer stocks; extended soft loans to sugar mills through banks to clear cane price dues; fixed Minimum Selling Price of sugar etc.
In sugar seasons 2019-20, 2020-21 & 2021-22 about 59.60 LMT, 70 LMT& 109 LMT of sugar was exported respectively.
As a result of these measures, financial conditions of sugar mills has improved and more than 99% of cane dues upto sugar seasons 2020-21 and 97.40% of cane dues for sugar season 2021-22 have been cleared.
With a view to support sugar sector and in the interest of sugarcane farmers, Government is encouraging sugar mills to divert excess sugarcane & sugar to ethanol. Government has allowed production of ethanol from B-Heavy molasses, sugarcane juice, sugar syrup and sugar and has also been fixing the remunerative ex-mill price of ethanol derived from various feed stocks. To achieve blending targets, Government is encouraging sugar mills and distilleries to enhance their distillation capacities for which Government is facilitating them to avail loans from banks for which interest subvention @ 6% or 50% of the interest charged by the banks whichever is lower is being borne by Government. As the revenues generated from sale of ethanol by sugar mills/distilleries reach to the accounts of sugar mills in around 3 weeks' time as against 3-15 months' time taken from sale of sugar, production of ethanol would improve liquidity of sugar mills enabling them to make timely payment of cane dues of sugarcane farmers.
In past three Ethanol Supply Years (December- November), revenue of about Rs. 48573 crore has been realized by sugar mills from the sale of ethanol to Oil Marketing Companies (OMCs), which has helped sugar mills/molasses based distilleries to make timely payment of cane dues of farmers.
14-Dec-2022: Efforts to Enhance Production Under Mission Coking Coal
Government has launched 'Mission Coking Coal' in August, 2021 to suggest roadmap to augment the production and utilization of domestic coking coal in India by 2030. Mission Coking Coal document has made recommendations majorly relating to new exploration, enhancing production, enhancing washing capacity, auction of new coking coal mines. Domestic raw Coking Coal production is likely to reach 140 MT [105 MT by CIL and 35 MT by allocated coking coal blocks] by 2030. The following transformative measures have been taken by the Government under ‘Atmanirbhar Bharat’ initiative to increase the domestic production of coking coal –
- CIL has planned to increase raw coking coal production from existing mines up to 26 MT and identified ten new mines with PRC of about 22 MT by FY 2025. Also, CIL has offered eight discontinued coking coal mines on revenue sharing model to the private sector with a PRC of 2 MT.
- CIL is setting up 9 new coking coal washeries and also revamping the existing coking coal washeries to augment washing capacity.
- Ministry of Coal has auctioned 10 coking coal blocks to the private sector with a PRC of 22.5 MT during the last two years. Most of these blocks are expected to start production by 2025.
- The Ministry has also identified four coking coal blocks and the CMPDI also will finalize GR for 4 to 6 new coking coal blocks in the next two months. These blocks may be offered in subsequent rounds of auction for private sector to further step up domestic raw coking coal supply in the country.
Between 22.05.2022 and 19.11.2022, imports of Anthracite and coking coal attracted NIL import duty [Nil BCD and NIL AIDC]. With effect from 19.11.2022, imports of Anthracite and coking coal, along with other types of coal, attract a concessional rate of 2.5% Customs duty [I% BCD and1.5% AIDC]. Government has taken this initiative to increase present blending of 10-12% of domestic coking coal with imported coking coal to 30% by FY2030 and reduce import of coking coal.
CIL undertakes constant efforts to enhance coking coal production by capacity enhancement through expansion of existing coking coal producing mines and from implementation of new coking coal blocks. Mass Production Technology has been introduced in UG mines of CIL to enhance the domestic raw coking coal production. CIL is taking steps regarding offering of coking coal mines for production to investors on revenue sharing basis.
13-Dec-2022: Increase in the use of Green Hydrogen
In the Independence Day speech on August 15, 2021, the Prime Minister announced the launch of National Hydrogen Mission. The Ministry of New and Renewable Energy has accordingly prepared a draft Mission document which inter-alia proposes to support production and deployment of Green Hydrogen.
Green Hydrogen can potentially be used to replace fossil fuels and fossil fuel based feedstocks in a number of sectors inter alia including fertilizer production, petroleum refining, steel production and transport applications.
8-Aug-2022: Government has announced a National Hydrogen Mission (NHM) in 2021, to develop Hydrogen as a fuel for transportation
The Minister of State for Petroleum and Natural Gas, Shri Rameswar Teli in a written reply to a question in the Rajya Sabha today informed that the CNG stations have been set up across the country.
Government has announced a National Hydrogen Mission (NHM) in 2021, which inter alia includes development of Hydrogen as a fuel for transportation. Various Research and Development (R&D) activities on Hydrogen are undertaken by Oil and Gas PSUs (OGPSUs). Further, OGPSUs have formed a Hydrogen Corpus Fund to fund R&D on various facts of Hydrogen including its application as an automotive fuel. Few R&D projects have also been undertaken by OGPSUs use green hydrogen for fuel cell based mobility.
Government has supported projects involving Research, Development & Technology Demonstration. Some of these projects are Hydrogen fuel based two wheelers, developed and demonstrated by Banaras Hindu University whereas Hydrogen fuel based three wheelers have been developed and demonstrated by Banaras Hindu University, IIT Delhi and Mahindra & Mahindra. Indian Oil Corporation Limited (IOCL) patented Hydrogen Spiked Compressed Natural Gas (H-CNG) technology has been demonstrated at Rajghat Bus depot on 50 BS-IV compliant commercial CNG buses as part of joint study with M/s Indraprastha Gas Limited.
Government has also promoted setting up of LNG stations on National Highways, golden quadrilaterals, etc. for promotion of LNG in long distance transportation.
6-Apr-2022: Green Hydrogen Method for Steel Production
Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) has proposed setting up of National Hydrogen Energy Mission with an aim to develop and scale up green hydrogen production technology, make it affordable and widely accessible. The steel sector has also been made a stakeholder in the Mission. Under this initiative, it has been proposed to set up pilot plants with part funding from Government to explore the feasibility of using green H2 in Direct Reduced Iron (DRI) production, by partly replacing natural gas with H2 in gas based DRI plants. Based on the success of the pilot projects, the gas based DRI units shall be encouraged for large scale adoption of the process.
Green H2 is produced through electrolysis of water using electricity produced from renewable energy. Green H2 is not commercially viable at present. However, with declining costs of renewable power generation and electrolysers, production of green hydrogen is likely to become cost competitive in future.
31-Mar-2022: National Hydrogen Mission
In his Independence Day speech on August 15, 2021, Hon’ble Prime Minister announced the launch of National Hydrogen Mission. The Ministry of New and Renewable Energy has accordingly prepared a draft Mission document.
The draft Mission proposes a framework inter-alia for a phased implementation approach, demand creation, a basket of measures to support production and utilization of Green Hydrogen, support for indigenous manufacturing, Research & Development, pilot projects, enabling policies and regulations, and infrastructure development. Both private companies and Public Private Partnership entities are expected to be facilitated by the measures proposed in the draft Mission.
The draft Mission inter alia proposes support for infrastructure development for storage and distribution of Green Hydrogen and its derivatives.
Ministry of Power’s orders issued on 17 February 2022 inter alia provides that “Manufacturers of Green Hydrogen / Green Ammonia shall be allowed to set up bunkers near Ports for storage of Green Ammonia for export / use by shipping. The land for the storage purpose shall be provided by the respective Port Authorities at applicable charges.”
The number of bunkers to be set up would depend on demand for exports and marine applications.
15-Apr-2021: India is looking towards kick-starting the hydrogen ecosystem development, says Shri Dharmendra Pradhan
Union Petroleum and Natural Gas & Steel Minister Shri Dharmendra Pradhan today said that India is looking towards various colors to kick-start the hydrogen ecosystem development. Addressing the Hydrogen RoundTable on “Hydrogen Economy: New Delhi Dialogue – 2021”, he said that in India, we have taken various initiatives with respect to the greater use of hydrogen in India’s energy mix. Government of India recently announced the National Hydrogen Mission in the Union Budget 2021 for making a hydrogen roadmap for the country. “We are working on a pilot project on Blue Hydrogen, Hydrogen CNG (H-CNG) and Green Hydrogen. Through technological advancements, we are blending hydrogen with compressed natural gas for use as transportation fuel as well as an industrial input to refineries. 50 buses in Delhi are plying on blended hydrogen in Compressed Natural Gas on a pilot basis. We plan to scale it up in the coming months across the major cities of India.”
The minister said that Energy is integral to support our fast-growing economy, and we are developing an energy sector which will be growth-centric, industry-friendly and environment-conscious. He said that we have the onerous task of ensuring energy justice and to end energy poverty in the country. This requires ample access to affordable energy to improve the lives of Indians coupled with the need to have a smaller carbon footprint.
Shri Pradhan said that the contours of India’s energy transition are changing fast. “Hon’ble Prime Minister of India Shri Narendra Modi has outlined a new energy map of India in October last year with seven key drivers, and, indeed, one of them is development of emerging fuels, particularly Hydrogen.” The minister said that the Government is developing a clear roadmap for a self-reliant India or an AatmaNirbhar Bharat, which seeks to place India as a manufacturing hub well-integrated with global supply chains. In this effort, energy will have a defining role.
Shri Pradhan said that hydrogen has great potential to emerge as a future source of energy. “The enthusiasm about hydrogen has a simple reason: whether it’s used in a fuel cell or burned to create heat, wherever hydrogen replaces fossil fuels, it slows global warming. Inclusion of “Hydrogen” as an energy carrier in the future energy portfolio presents a unique opportunity to address emerging energy vectors, including power to gas, power to power, and power to mobility and even vehicle to grid applications.”
The Minister said that India remains committed to environmental and climate causes with a massive thrust on deploying renewable energy and energy efficiency measures. In the past six years, India has increased its renewable power portfolio from 32 GW to almost 100 GW. “We are well on track to achieve 450 GW target of renewable energy generating capacity by 2030, he added. Diversification of our energy basket would be the key lever enabling this transition. However, it is equally important that the new energy-mix options synergize and co-exist with the established base technology already operational in the respective countries, in which, huge capital investments have been made. That’s why the emergence of hydrogen at the centre stage is a welcome development.”
Shri Pradhan said that Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas is committed to augment the hydrogen supply chain infrastructure in the country. “Presently, as in the case of other countries, our petroleum sector is the largest producer of hydrogen for various refinery process operations. Hence, we realize petroleum sector’s capability to produce hydrogen molecules, stored and traded as gas, making it a natural votary of this new energy form. It provides us an opportunity to utilize existing business models and infrastructure unlike other e-options.”
The Minister said that Hydrogen is also capable of aligning with the Ministry’s other flagship schemes, like the promotion of compressed biogas under the Sustainable Alternative for Affordable towards Transportation (SATAT) scheme or promoting the gas-based economy or other initiatives on Waste-to-Energy. Such an integration will impart much more flexibility and capacity utilization to the vast infrastructure available or being created in India. He said that the utility of hydrogen is not going to be limited only to the transport sector. The maturity of the ecosystem can be accelerated through its usage as a decarbonizing agent for a range of sectors, including industry covering chemicals, iron, steel, fertilizer and refining, transport, heat and power.
Shri Pradhan said that by establishing synergies with natural gas, hydrogen can be easily adopted in the energy mix without seeking major infrastructural overhauling. “We are looking forward to introduce H-CNG as an intermittent technology in a big way for both automotive and domestic cooking applications.”
He said that Our refineries are planning to leverage the available surplus hydrogen capacities in gray form for meeting the initial demand in mainstreaming hydrogen. “One of such projects is underway at our Gujarat refinery of Indian Oil wherein the combination of hydrogen production through natural gas and its hyphenation with the carbon capture technology will result in the production of blue hydrogen. Multiple buses powered by fuel cells will be covering various iconic routes. Efforts are underway to leverage the vast CNG pipeline infrastructure to reduce the transportation cost of hydrogen.”
The Minister announced that India, with its steadfast efforts towards leading the energy transition, backed by robust political will, is committed to engage with partners for ushering-in the hydrogen economy.