India needs 2K mn ton oil, 1 mn MW power to sustain 9% growth

India needs about 2,000 million tons of oil and 1 million MW of power
by 2030 to sustain a growth rate of 9 per cent and could fall well-
short of meeting its future energy needs if the Indo-US nuclear deal
failed to happen, Planning Commission member (Energy) Kirit Parikh
said.

"If we project a growth rate of eight to nine per cent per year in the
next 25 years, by 2030, we will be required to have 1700-2000 million
tonnes of oil. For that we need to have huge amount of expansion in
our energy production," Parikh said in Chennai on Thursday at an
international conference.

"If we do not get the nuclear agreement with the US, and we are not
able to import any uranium... from abroad, at the most we can generate
only 48,000 MW of power of the targeted 1 million MW by 2030," he
said.

Delivering a lecture on 'Renewable Energy for Sustainable Future' at
Green Power 2008 at the conference organised by the Confederation of
Indian Industry, he said: "We need rapid economic growth and for that
we need energy."

On the electricity front, he said the country's power capacity would
increase from the present 1,60,000 MW to 8,00,000 MW in the next 15-20
years.

Pointing out that the country was short of fuel of all kinds, he said
the present oil consumption was around 110 million tons, out of which
domestic production was 33-34 million tons.

"By 2030, this may go up to 50 million tonnes and the demand for oil
from 110 million tonnes to 400 million tonnes. Nuclear (energy) is the
one solution which we are planning to develop and currently we have
around 3900 MW of nuclear power installed capacity, just around two
per cent of the total 1,60,000 MW capacity," he said