Clean Energy Generation In India To Help Generate More Employment Opportunities

clean energy in india

clean energy in india

Power generation through coal and natural gas is a major cause for the decline in the quality of the environment through air and water pollution. Clean energy is when renewable resources like the wind and solar power are used to generate power with little or no pollution and global warming emissions.

India stepped up as a global leader in demonstrating how a growing economy can scale up renewables when just before 2015 Paris Climate summit Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced the ambitious target of 175 GW renewable power which included 100 GW Solar power and 60 GW wind power.

A study on the clean energy generation in India was conducted by the Greening India’s Workforce: Gearing Up For Expansion of Solar and Wind Power in India published by Delhi-based think tank, Council on Energy, Environment and Water (CEEW), and the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC). According to the study India stands to gain in the following ways through the generation of clean energy:

  • India’s clean energy sector which involves the installation of 175 gigawatts (GW) of renewable power by 2022 through wind and solar energy has the potential to employ more than 300,000 new workers.
  • The clean energy workforce includes solar installers, maintenance workers, engineers, technicians and performance data monitors.
  • Overall one million employment opportunities will be generated including 34,600 people to work in wind power, 58,600 in utility solar and 238,000 in rooftop solar jobs over the next five years.
  • 21,000 additional employment opportunities have been generated in the solar and wind energy sectors in 2016-17 and an additional 25,000 placements are expected over the coming year.
  • Labour-intensive rooftop segment is expected to employ 70% of the new workforce, creating seven times more jobs than large-scale projects such as solar farms.
  • An additional 45,000 people will be employed full time in India with the strong growth in the domestic solar manufacturing industry.
  •  80% of the new clean energy workforce will be employed during the construction phase
  • At present, India’s installed wind power capacity is 32.2GW and solar is 12.2GW.

The study by CEEW states, “Solar jobs will be well distributed across India with Maharashtra and Uttar Pradesh leading in job creation. Wind jobs are likely to be concentrated in a few states that have high wind potential, as has been the case with wind capacity.”

It is indeed time to choose the renewables first for a cleaner, safer, and healthier energy future, and India is right there in the forefront working towards it.