India to push for international biofuel alliance at G20: Puri
1 min read . Updated: 19 Oct 2022, 10:31 PM IST
Premium- Union Minister for Petroleum and Natural Gas Hardeep Singh Puri informed that during its G20 presidency India will push for international biofuel alliance
India will push for setting up an international biofuel alliance during its G20 presidency, said union minister for petroleum and natural gas Hardeep Singh Puri on Wednesday.
Addressing SIAM’s international conference on biofuels - ‘A Pathway Towards Sustainable Future’, the minister said that India will be ready with 20% ethanol blended petrol at select fuel pumps by April 2023.
“We will utilize our G20 presidency to try and set up an international biofuel alliance," he said.
Mint had exclusively reported on 17 September that India is looking at creating an alliance of biofuel producing countries when its takes up the G20 presidency in December.
India is set to take up the G20 Presidency in December 2022. Several major biofuel producers including the US, Brazil, Argentina, Indonesia and China are part of G20. During the Brazilian mines an energy minister Bento Albuquerque visit to India in April, both the countries agreed on the importance of strengthening the bilateral cooperation in bioenergy and agreed to work towards developing an Indian-Brazil Alliance for bioenergy and biofuels.
Addressing the conference, the minister said: “India is ready from the supply side to launch E20 and the E20 fuel will be available from April 2023. Target for 20 percent blending has been advanced by 5 years from 2030 to 2025."
He also said that there is a need to massively upscale the production of flex-fuel engine vehicles in the country.
The minister assured the automobile manufacturers that as the world’s fastest-growing and most robust major economy, there will be guaranteed consumer demand for flex-fuel and E20-compatible vehicles, said a statement from the ministry of petroleum and natural gas.
The National Biofuel Policy was enacted in 2018 to promote the production and consumption of biofuels. Ethanol-blending percentage in petrol rose sharply from 0.67% in 2013 to 10% in May 2022, about five months ahead of schedule, the minister said.
The minister added that the policy has translated into a reduction of 2.7 million tonne of CO2 emissions and savings of more than ₹50,000 crore of foreign exchange. Achieving E20 blending with petrol by 2025 would help save foreign exchange for the country worth about ₹30,000 crore per annum, Puri said.
