BENGALURU: The second edition of RE-Invest, India’s flagship global renewable energy event, which was scheduled for December 7-9 at the India Expo Mart in Greater Noida has been postponed once again.
“The dates were inconvenient for some of our important stakeholders,” said Anand Kumar, secretary in the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy, which is organising the event. “It will now be held at the same venue on April 19-21, 2018.”
This is the fourth time the event has been rescheduled after the first edition in February 2015. The second edition scheduled for February 2016 was pushed to November and then to February 2017, when the venue was shifted from Greater Noida to Gandhinagar in Gujarat.
The event was postponed again to December 7-9. While no official reasons were given, government officials said there weren’t enough sponsors.
Germany was India’s ‘partner country’ for the first RE-Invest. France is the partner for the second, with President Emmanuel Macron scheduled to attend. Officials said Macron has been requested to postpone his visit. A highlight of the event was to have been the founding ceremony of the International Solar Alliance promoted jointly by India and France.
The RE-Invest events were envisioned as global meetings to deliberate upon strategies for development of renewable energy, showcasing India’s achievements in the sector and inviting investment. The 2015 event had 200 speakers from 29 countries and 2,800 delegates from 42 countries, including representatives of 578 Indian companies and 124 foreign ones.
Only a fraction of the investment commitments made by companies and lending pledges by banks have been realised so far. Against India’s target of achieving 175 GW capacity of renewable energy by 2022, more than 270 GW of such projects had been promised – 58 GW by foreign companies, 191 GW by Indian private companies, 18 GW by public sector units and 5 GW by the Indian Railways.
Only 39.3 GW of capacity has been commissioned or is under construction so far, according to a government statement in October. While banks had pledged Rs 4 lakh crore, only Rs 1.8 lakh crore had been sanctioned, with disbursals of Rs 1.37 lakh crore.
Source: economictimes.indiatimes
