Telangana government would examine the possibility of establishing a commission on environment and sustainable development to address the impact of global warming on Telangana mainly in agriculture and energy sectors.
Irrigation Minister N. Uttam Kumar Reddy gave this assurance while delivering his address at a media workshop on “Clean Energy Transition in India: Focus on Telangana”. It was organised jointly by Press Club Hyderabad, Citizen Consumer and Civic Action Group (CAG), Chennai, and People’s Monitoring Group on Electricity Regulation (PMGER) on Saturday.
The Minister concurred with the view that clean energy transition is imperative and cannot be ignored if future generations have to live in this planet. He said it was everyone’s responsibility to leave the planet, at least the way they inherited it from their parents, so that the next generation doesn’t suffer.
Mr. Reddy said the Congress government was open for experts to make suggestions, unlike the previous government. Recalling his role as a member of the Parliamentary Committee on Energy, he said he was exposed to energy issues and their relationship with the environment and development. He said his participation as India’s representative at the United Nations Climate Change Conference or COP 27 in Egypt in 2022 opened up new understandings and it would help him in making policies on energy use.
Mr. Reddy lauded the efforts of the organisers to generate debate on clean energy transition in Telangana and assured that recommendations from the workshop would be given serious thought at the cabinet level.
Eminent resource persons such as Purushotham Reddy, M. Venugopal Rao, R. Dileep Reddy, K. Babu Rao, Narasimha Reddy Donthi, Richa Mishra and Vishnu Rao addressed various challenges in the push for clean energy transition in India and Telangana.
They came up with suggestions and recommendations including increasing public investments in renewable energy in Telangana, developing a legal and policy framework for deepening the usage of renewable energy, reviewing the burden of increasing electricity demand on Telangana due to lift irrigation projects, intensive urbanization in Hyderabad and the direction of agricultural growth.
Electricity-intensive agriculture increases the cost of production and also forces farmers to adopt practices of industrial agriculture, they argued. The workshop was intended to increase awareness among the media personnel on issues concerning energy and sustainable development in the context of climate change.
