Counterview Desk Power and climate policy analyst Shankar Sharma, in a letter to RK Singh, Union Minister for power and NRE, with copies to the NITI Aayog vice chairman and the Prime Minister, has said that the reported Technical & Commercial loss in the electricity sector during 2020-21 was 22.32% took place even as the country witnessing "Steep degradation" of natural resources - land, air, water, minerals etc.

These losses have taken place at time when "Our authorities seem to be unduly influenced by unsubstantiated and uni-dimensional projections such as the claims that the cost of India quitting coal is $900 billion, and that nuclear power saves 41 million tonnes of carbon emissions every year", Sharma asserted.

Text: Whereas the power/ energy sector in the country has been facing serious and multiple crises since many decades, the same can be said to be getting worse in recent years due to the calamitous threats associated with the Climate Change, and due to an evident lack of clarity as to what is needed for our people in the medium to long term.

A glaring contradiction is the unacceptable level of inefficiency in the power sector, while our authorities continue to pour our meagre resources to build more of the conventional kind of power plants, and the associated infrastructure such as coal mines, dams, transmission lines etc.

Massive additions in the form of conventional kind of power plants and the associated infrastructure such as coal mines, dams, power lines etc.

The concerned authorities are continuing to ignore not only these harsh realities in our power sector, but also are indifferent to many of the developments from across the globe in better management of the power sector.

Our authorities seem to be unduly influenced by unsubstantiated and uni-dimensional projections such as the claims that the cost of India quitting coal is $900 billion, and that nuclear power saves 41 million tonnes of carbon emissions every year.

Read In Detail