ENERGY AND POWER IN INDIA

Petroleum reserves were estimated at 4.8 billion barrels in early 2002. From less than 100,000 tons in 1951, crude oil production rose to 37.1 million tons in 1995. Production was 1.9 million barrels per day in 2001, and expected to grow to 3.4 million barrels per day by 2010. Oil exploration and production are undertaken in joint ventures between government and private foreign companies. Oil accounts for roughly 30% of India’s energy consumption. Production of natural gas increased from 920 million cu m in 1973 to 21,300 million cu m in 1999. In 2000, India consumed 509.9 billion kWh of electricity, of which 1.675 billion kWh was imported. Total installed electric capacity, which was 18,500 MW in 1974, rose to 111,777 MW in 2001. Production in 2000 was 512 billion kWh, of which 83.4% was from fossil fuels, 13.9% from hydropower, 2.6% from nuclear power, and the rest from other sources. A 380 MW nuclear power station, India’s first, was completed with US assistance in 1969 at Tarapur, near Mumbai (formerly Bombay). (The Tarapur plant has long been a center of controversy because of India’s alleged failure to observe international safeguards to prevent the diversion of nuclear materials for military purposes.) Another nuclear station, in Rajasthan, began partial operations in the early 1970s, and two more plants were added by the end of the decade. In 1996, India had 10 operating reactors with a combined capacity of 1,695 MW, and four more under construction with a planned capacity of 808 MW. In 1999, the 740 MW initial phase of the Dabhol LNG-fired power plant began operation. (LNG is liquefied natural gas.) Under the Commission on Additional Sources of Energy, within the Department of Science and Technology, research programs in biogas and biomass have been established. Demonstration projects in solar and wind energy were also undertaken in the early 1980s.