The Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) is a ministry of the Government of India, headed by current Union Cabinet Minister Pralhad Joshi, that is mainly responsible for research and development, intellectual property protection, and international cooperation, promotion, and coordination in renewable energy sources such as wind power, small hydro, biogas, Battery Energy Storage and solar power. The broad aim of the ministry is to develop and deploy new and renewable energy for supplementing the energy requirements of India. The ministry is headquartered in Lodhi Road, New Delhi. According to the Ministry's 2016-17 annual report, India has made significant advances in several renewable energy sectors which include, solar energy, wind power, Battery energy storage system (BESS) and hydroelectricity.

History

The 1970s energy crisis led to the establishment of the Commission for Additional Sources of Energy (CASE) in the Department of Science & Technology (India) in March 1981. The CASE was responsible for the formulation of policies and their implementation, creation of programmes for development of new and renewable energy and coordinating and intensifying R&D in the sector. In 1982, a new department was created in the then Ministry of Energy, i.e., Department of Non-conventional Energy Sources (DNES). DNES incorporated CASE under its umbrella. The ministry was established as the Ministry of Non-Conventional Energy Sources in 1992. It adopted its current name in October 2006.

Mission

The Mission of the Ministry is to ensure

Vision

To develop new and renewable energy technologies, processes, materials, components, sub-systems, products & services at par with international specifications, standards and performance parameters in order to make the country a net foreign exchange earner in the sector and deploy such indigenously developed and/or manufactured products and services in furtherance of the national goal of energy security.

Key functional areas

The major functional area or Allocation of Business of MNRE are:

Initiatives

Achievements

Power from renewables

Grid-based

As per Annual Report 2016-17 of Ministry, As of December 2016, the Ministry was successful in deploying a total of 50068.37 Megawatt (MW) capacity of grid-based renewable energy. 28700.44 MW of which was from Wind power, 4333.85 MW from Small hydro Power, 7907.34 MW from Bio power 9012.66 MW from Solar power (SPV), and the rest 114.08 MW from Waste to Power.

Off-grid

During the same time period, the total deployment of an Off-grid based renewable energy capacity was about 1403.70 MW. Of these, Biomass (non-bagasse) Cogeneration consisted of 651.91 MW, Bio mass Gasifier was 186.88 MW Waste to energy was 163.35 MW, SPV Systems (of less than 1 Kilowatt (kW)) capacity was 405.54 1 MW, and the rest from micro-Hydro and Wind power.

Other renewable energy systems

The total number of deployment of Family Biogas plant was 49.40 lakhs. And the total area that is covered with Solar water heating (SWH) systems was 4.47 Million m2.

Institutions

The Ministry has 5 specialized technical institution. They are:-

State Nodal Agencies

The Ministry has established state nodal agencies in different states and union territories of India to promote and expand the growth of efficient energy use of renewable energy in their respective states. The primary objective of a state nodal agency under this ministry is to develop, coordinate, finance and promote research projects in the new and renewable energy field. It is also expected to devise programmes for research and development as well as applicative extensions of new and renewable energy sources.

Cabinet Ministers

Ministers of State