Cooperative federalism will be the leitmotif of Niti Aayog’s governing council meeting on Sunday chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The third meeting of the governing council which also has chief ministers of states and union territories as members, comes in the backdrop of fundamental reordering of federal fiscal relations which includes larger transfers to states for funding of centrally sponsored schemes.

Publication: Live Mint

The World Bank is in talks with the ministry of new and renewable energy (MNRE) to replicate the Rewa Ultra Mega Solar model, which saw record low-winning bids of Rs2.97 per kilowatt-hour (kWh) earlier this year. Speaking at Confederation of Indian Industry’s (CII) 4th Renewable Energy Summit on Friday, Amit Jain, Renwable Energy Specialist, World Bank said, “We are in talks with MNRE to replicate the Rewa model on a national scale. We are talking to the government of Odisha for the same.”

Publication: ET Energy World

Tata Motors started commercial test drive of its first batch of electric buses under the Marcopolo brand in Shimla over the weekend. “Last Friday we successfully piloted our first electric bus in Shimla. It was carried out jointly with the Himachal Road Transport Corporation and the state transport department. The 9-meter bus, with a seating capacity of 31 people, was piloted on the Parwanu-Kalka route with the round- trip distance of 160km with no charging en-route,” A K Jindal, head of engineering, commercial vehicles, Tata Motors told PTI.

Publication: Business Standard

After a lull of two years, the Chennai smart city project will move forward in 2017, focussing on traffic congestion. Congested commercial hub T Nagar will be the first to benefit from the smart city project and the next area in the pipeline is Broadway, a senior corporation official said. The official also noted that the smart city project will progress at its own pace and has nothing to do with the current state political scenario. The Rs 200 crore smart city project has now cleared all the paper works and the complete recruitment process for Chennai smart city Ltd will be over by next month.

Publication: Deccan Chronicle

While reviewing the progress of smart city project in Lucknow on April 21, the divisional commissioner found that most of the project is pending because of lack of coordination between various government departments. He ordered departments like Traffic Police, Jal Sansthan, Jal Nigam, LDA, Lucknow Metro, City Transport etc to submit DPRs of important key projects in their departments to the smart city consultant on priority so that they can be merged with the plan.

Publication: The Times of India

The non-conventional is conventional now. Renewable energy has made the definitive break from its sustainability moorings to reshape commercial power markets worldwide. From Kadapa to California, solar power has made headlines of late, for the lowest tariff (`3.15 per kWh) and for a record contribution (40% of power supplied for part day), respectively. Over the last fifteen years, renewable energy in India has progressed from 3% to 15% of installed capacity, and from a subsidised to competitive power source. But how sustainable is it?

Publication: Financial Express

Northern India, with the potential of about 363 GW of power, can emerge as the hub for renewable energy in the country, said a study released on Friday. The report titled ‘State Renewable Energy Policies: A Comparative Study’ was released by industry lobby Confederation of Indian Industry (CII). It highlighted that southern and western regions of the country are fast moving up the renewable energy installed capacity graph. The study also stressed that the ecosystem of renewable energy in India is still fraught with constraints, particularly with respect to state policies.

Publication: Live Mint

A unique customer engagement initiative aimed at encouraging a clean drive for a greener and better today and tomorrow, the drive was organized in Delhi, Pune and Bengaluru. A cavalcade of around 50 EVs in Delhi, 25 EVs in Pune and 77 EVs in Bengaluru from the Mahindra Electric stable, which included the e2o, e2oPlus and the e-Verito drove around these 3 cities spreading the message of conserving the Earth and making it a better place to stay. The idea was to encourage people to go green by switching to a zero emissions car.

Publication: India Blooms

The Paris Agreement reached at the 21st Conference of Parties (COP) in December 2015 was a major milestone that capped more than two decades of global negotiations aimed at averting dangerous climate change. The outcome was reflective of wider acceptance that a low-carbon transformation of the world’s energy systems is indeed possible, even inevitable, in the context of rapidly falling renewables costs and an unprecedented degree of action by nations, civil society, businesses, industry, cities, and other stakeholders.

Publication: YourStory

India’s renewable energy sector is going through a major transformation with record capacity additions being achieved in the solar and wind power sectors and tariffs falling to record low levels. The government is working on policies to further firm up the incentive structure for projects, Rajeev Kapoor, Secretary, Ministry of New and Renewable Energy told Debapriya Mondal and Anisha Dutta in an exclusive interview.

Publication: ET Energy World

The AP Pollution Control Board (APPCB) and the Regional Science Centre (RSC) jointly organised a rally here on Saturday, on the occasion of the World Earth Day. Rally was taken out from the APPCB office to RSC.Students of Visvam education institutions, Little Angels institute, NCC, Youngistan staff and representatives of various industries participated in the rally. On the occasion, the RSC exhibited science shows for students.

Publication: The Hans India

Haryana Minister of State for New and Renewable Energy Banwari Lal today appealed to the people to adopt clean energy to protect the environment. The minister was speaking at a function organised by the Department of New and Renewable Energy as part of the ‘Swarna Jayanti Year Celebrations’ to mark World Earth Day at Panchkula, near here, an official release said. While hundreds of school children participated in a walk to spread the message of ‘clean energy-green energy’, political leaders, administrators and experts also appealed to the people to adopt clean energy.

Publication: ET Energy World