Energy audit gives govt a new power
Sreelatha Menon / New Delhi March 17, 2009, 0:37 IST

In a bid to regulate the carbon emission levels by the private sector, the government is evolving a PAT (Perform, Achieve and Trade) regime in an area of economic activity that is going to dominate global power politics in the years to come.

The PAT scheme is being designed by the National Mission for Energy Efficiency under the PM’s National Action Plan for Climate Change. Under the scheme, energy saving certificates or ESCerts would be issued by the Bureau of Energy Efficiency (BEE) to industrial units against energy efficiency targets set for them by the BEE.

Units that exceed targets for energy efficiency can sell the ESCerts to units that fall short of targets.

However, the scheme, which is similar to the Kyoto Protocol is limited to energy efficiency targets and does not cover other sources of carbon emissions.

According to the Prime Minister’s Special Envoy on Climate Change, former Foreign Secretary Shyam Saran who took part in a session organised by Confederation of Indian Industries (CII) today, the government is working with industry, associations and ministries related with each sector to develop targets for energy use.

Once targets are set, industrial units under PAT will be obliged to meet those targets or buy certificates to cover the gaps in their efficiency, he told Business Standard, adding that the targets were yet to be fixed.

According to V Raghuraman, principal advisor on energy and environment to CII and a member of the government’s task force on energy efficiency, industry was engaged with each step of the programme and there was no conflict of interest. “Energy efficiency certificates are being evolved and auditors are being prepared,” he added.

So far seven examinations for energy auditors have been held by the BEE, which is the nodal agency for the programme and 5,000 auditors have cleared the examination.

These auditors would work for energy service companies and would provide the services at a cost, he said. The Director-General, Bureau of Energy Efficiency, Ajay Mathur, said it will take at least two years before the programme is rolled out in the country. Since there is a business model for this scheme, it is unlikely there would be much resistance from industry, he added.

He said that nine sectors viz thermal power, fertilisers, steel , cement, pulp and paper, aluminium, chlor alkali, textiles and railways will be allocated energy efficiency targets. Each unit would be scanned, and to identify units, a baseline study for each sector has already begun, he said.

These nine sectors except railways, have been allocated to agencies for these studies to collect data. He said the US did a similar self-targeting scheme for sulphur dioxide and it took seven years to roll it out.

“So we should hope to roll it out in at least two years,” he said.

ESCerts would be issued as virtual share certificates and the repositories would be the national depositories for shares. He said that the two power exchanges in the country would help companies trade certificates. The auditors would be doing a gate to gate audit or measuring energy input against product output and measuring the energy use per tonne of produce and measure these against the target for that unit.

He said consultations had been held with manufacturing associations like Fertiliser Association of India, the national representative body of fertiliser manufacturers, textile research associations like Bombay Textile Research Association, Northern India Textile Research Association and South India Textile Research Association, and the Joint Plant Committee, the official custodian for iron and steel data in the country.

He said that under the Energy Conservation Act, BEE can issue energy consumption norms and also impose penalties on defaulters.Since it is a model that with a business window, it is expected to succeed.