The Uttar Pradesh government organised a three-day long Global Investors Summit from February 10 to February 12 to call upon investments in various sectors from national as well as international players.
State Minister of Energy & Additional Energy Sources, Arvind Kumar Sharma said of the total investment worth more than Rs 32 lakh crore were received by the government till the morning of February 10. The proposals for the energy sector were of Rs 7 lakh crore, higher than any other sector.
The energy minister assured the entrepreneurs signing the Memorandum of Understanding [MoUs], “We will resolve issues at speed of electricity. We will be knocking at your doors to take an update on the progress of these agreements, till they get turned into projects.”
The investors present at the summit were Hygenco, Amplus Solar, EREDA, Geothermal Core, Welspun Group amongst others. The largest amount of Rs 75,000 MoU was signed by the NTPC to produce both fossil and non-fossil power, Rs 20,000 crore by AVADA to set green hydrogen and ammonia, and Rs 800 crore by the Geothermal Core to produce geothermal power.
Somendra Tomar from UPPCL addressing the crowd during a session on sustainable development through renewable energy in Global Investors Summit. Photo by Aishwarya Tripathi.
The investors present at the summit praised the governments’ solar and bio-energy policies issued recently but put forth some challenges too. The investors sorted government help to acquire land to set up renewable energy plants and provide a solution for banking of power.
Floating solar was looked at to have huge potential and NTPC head Gurdeep Singh expressed willingness on stage to set up a floating solar plant in the Rihand dam.
The Uttar Pradesh Power Corporation Limited (UPPCL) representative Somendra Tomar that has Rihand dam under their governance agreed to the proposal, though not in writing.
“While multiplication of energy is the need of the hour, efforts have to be made to meet the energy requirement from renewable sources as much as possible,” Sharma said.
Union Secretary, Ministry of Energy, Alok Kumar said that emission was bound to happen as India tried to grow and develop due to which electricity demand was growing fast, but the speed of emission needed to be slowed down.
“Three-Fourths of the total greenhouse emissions come from the energy sector. We need to look at the Paris Agreement again and by 2030, 50 per cent of our energy needs to be sufficed through non-fossil energy sources,” the Union Secretary said.
The minister added that rising energy demand is a challenge and even as the government intends to tap into renewable energy sources, industries need to be set up to look at lithium production.
“How will you produce so much battery? From where will we get so much of Lithium,” Kumar questioned.
“There are two things that can be done to deal with emissions. One, efforts should be made to produce more and more energy from non-fossil sources like solar. And two, emission intensity has to be reduced,” he suggested. He said ensuring energy efficiency by industries like cement and steel, could help manage the emission intensity. Moreover, he emphasised that the Uttar Pradesh government needs to raise awareness amongst smaller upbhokta to use energy efficient appliances and reduce air-conditioning load.
Sports gets attention
On the third day of the summit, on February 12, an investment event was organised to understand the undiscovered potential of the sector.
The Uttar Pradesh government signed several Memorandum of Understanding (MoUs) in the presence of Anurag Singh Thakur, Union Minister of Youth Affairs & Sports and Information and Broadcasting; Girish Chandra Yadav, Minister of State, Sports and Youth Welfare; and Navneet Sehgal, State Additional Chief Secretary, Department of Sports and Youth Welfare.
The panel also saw the presence of eminent sports personalities like Abhinav Bindra, Indian Olympic Gold Medalist and Indian Cricketer Suresh Raina.
Amongst the intended investors were HCL Foundation, Sporta Technologies, Abhinav Futuristics, Rugby India, The European Business & Technology Centre, MotoGP Bharat, amongst others.
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HCL Foundation, being represented by Nidhi Pundhir — the only woman from a private partnership on stage to sign the MoU — intends to work with 5,000 underserved children and youth and persons with a disability to identify and nurture talent in multiple sports with the vision of mainstreaming them in the existing sports ecosystem of India. The proposed project will be implemented in Lucknow, Gautam Buddha Nagar & Hardoi districts of Uttar Pradesh.
The Union Minister, Anurag Thakur said, “Today marks a new vision for Uttar Pradesh as this is the first time ever that a sports investment session is being organised which spotlights how important the sector is to the government. We have passed a historical sports budget earlier this month to give a further impetus to the sports sector and ensure that no youth is left behind due to shortage of money, access to good stadiums and training.”
Thakur also spoke about pushing the females further in sport and keeping a focus on rural India as well.
“In the recent championships, we have witnessed players from rural regions perform better,” he said.
Abhinav Bindra, Olympic Gold Medallist and Founder, Abhinav Bindra Targeting Performance said: “We envision a partnership with the state government to set up a state of the art centre for high performance and injury management. Also, through my foundation, I pledge to take care of the needs of all the athletes of the state who may get injured and require surgical intervention.”
Sehgal, the Additional Secretary said that the state has been proactive in developing its own sports development strategies while promoting and implementing the Central Government initiatives for the athletes’ benefit.
Moreover, he assured that moving forward, the Department of Sports envisions putting Uttar Pradesh at the forefront of the national sporting movement.
Girish Chandra Yadav, Minister of State, Sports and Youth Welfare said that the state has helped push sports in an organised manner.
“We are preparing grounds in every gram panchayat, making open gyms, making mini stadiums, making stadiums in every district, and promoting sports colleges, alongside private academies,” he added.
