The ever increasing demand for electricity can be met only by developing renewable and pollution-free energy sources as well as efficient power (energy) conversion methods. Conventional generation sources that have an average gestation of six years will not meet the rapid increase in demand, said former IIT Kanpur professor M. Ramamoorthy. He is also the conference chair of the three-day ‘Advances in Power Conversion and Energy Technologies (APCET) 2012’ international conference being conducted at the Lakireddi Bali Reddy College of Engineering here on Thursday.
Addressing power and energy experts, at the inauguration of the conference, Prof. Ramamoorthy said that in spite of having a total generating capacity of about 200,000 MW, the Indian power utilities were not able to meet a peak demand of about 1,40,000 MW. The country suffered from severe power shortages, both in energy and demand .To satisfy the growth in demand it is planned to increase the generation capacity to 4,50,000 MW by the year 2020. The objective as per the National Electricity Policy is to provide electricity to every home and raise the per capita consumption to 1000 units. This huge addition to the installed capacity in about ten years could not come through conventional generation. Enough contribution should come only through renewable energy sources and efficient conversion of power.
JNTU Kakinada Vice-Chancellor G.Tulasi Ram Das said that climate change and global warming have increased the responsibilities of energy experts.
It was said that there were blackouts only in the US and Europe, but one happened in India recently. This was due to indiscipline on the part of consumers and lack of vision on the part of policy makers.
India had an abundant supply of solar energy but the investment involved was huge. The storage of power generated at various points was another major problem and explained the different battery systems – lithium ion, simple fuel cells, Proton Exchange Membrane fuel cells and hydrogen cells available.
Head of EEE department and technical chair of the conference Y.P.Obulesh said that out of the total 470 papers received, the technical review committee, after scrutiny, has selected 64 papers for oral presentation and 26 poster presentations at the conference. The presentations have been organised into four technical sessions namely, Power Electronics & Drives, Control Systems, Power Systems and Energy Systems. Founder chairman of the engineering college Lakireddy Bali Reddy said that the college was being run on a non-profit basis, although funds were needed. He hoped that students who have passed out of the institute and have done well will provide endowments to the college like in the US. College managing trustee Lakireddy Jayaprakash Reddy and director L.S.S.Reddy were present.
