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CFL bulb scheme will be world's biggest carbon credit project
NEW DELHI: India has bagged the world's largest carbon credit project that will help replace 400 million incandescent light bulbs with energy saving CFL bulbs at dirt-cheap prices in a year while preventing 40 million tonnes of carbon from entering the atmosphere annually.
The project, which will allow the government, investors, discoms and CFL manufacturers to sell CFLs at Rs 15 each, instead of the Rs 100 they currently cost on average, has been approved by the UN under the global carbon credit scheme called Clean Development Mechanism.
The mammoth size of the project can be gauged from the fact that the world's second largest CDM project earns only about 1.5 million credits a year in comparison.
"Almost half the households in India will immediately benefit from the scheme and as other areas get electrified, those villages will get added on. There are roughly 400 million light points at present in the country that we will provide the subsidised CFL bulbs for," said Ajay Mathur, director general of the Bureau of Energy Efficiency, which is the nodal agency for the grand project.
The scheme -- called Bachat Lamp Yojna -- works like this. The discom in a state decides to implement the scheme. It picks up a financial investor, which lends the upfront finance to buy the CFL bulbs at market price to replace the bulbs in the discom's area. The discom then distributes the bulb to its consumers at Rs 15 apiece and collects the regular bulbs, which it then destroys.
For every ten bulbs that consumers use for a year, a tonne of carbon is prevented from escaping into the atmosphere as CFL bulbs use substantially less power than incandescent ones. For every tonne of carbon saved, the Bureau of Energy Efficiency, acting as the anchor, gets a carbon certificate from the UN, which it then hands over to the investor.
The investor sells the carbon credit in the international market where buyers -- such as manufacturers and power producers in Europe -- buy the certificates to meet the greenhouse gas emission reduction targets the countries have set for them. At present, each certificate sells at around 10-12 Euros in the international spot market.
BEE estimates that investors will be able to recover the rest of the Rs 85 per bulb by 5-6 years and by the 7th year, earn some on the top. BEE has in its scheme ensured that the CFL bulbs are of a standard that they last that long.
Several states and cities have been ready to take advantage of the scheme the moment it becomes operational. Kerala is one such state. It has already found investors and tied up with manufacturers to distribute roughly 1.5 crore bulbs in the state. In anticipation of the project clearance, it has begun distribution of the energy saving bulbs to consumers.
States like Uttarakhand and Punjab and cities like Hyderabad are also ready to roll out the scheme within a month.
The project has got clearance as a "programme for activities' under the UN system which allowed BEE to make the one-time investment of resources and time to get a clearance for the scheme which the discom or investors can take advantage of as they get on board any time later. BEE estimates it cost them about Rs 1 crore to get the clearance and three years of painstaking background work which included the time taken to study the standalone pilot projects in Yamunangar and Vishakapatnam to finetune the scheme.
Buoyed by the speed at which they have been able to get the green light for the project from UN, BEE has begun discussions on the next quantum leap which could save even more power for the country and generate a substantially higher number of carbon credits -- putting Indian households on to LED lamps.
CFL bulb scheme will be world's biggest carbon credit project - India - The Times of India
NEW DELHI: India has bagged the world's largest carbon credit project that will help replace 400 million incandescent light bulbs with energy saving CFL bulbs at dirt-cheap prices in a year while preventing 40 million tonnes of carbon from entering the atmosphere annually.
The project, which will allow the government, investors, discoms and CFL manufacturers to sell CFLs at Rs 15 each, instead of the Rs 100 they currently cost on average, has been approved by the UN under the global carbon credit scheme called Clean Development Mechanism.
The mammoth size of the project can be gauged from the fact that the world's second largest CDM project earns only about 1.5 million credits a year in comparison.
"Almost half the households in India will immediately benefit from the scheme and as other areas get electrified, those villages will get added on. There are roughly 400 million light points at present in the country that we will provide the subsidised CFL bulbs for," said Ajay Mathur, director general of the Bureau of Energy Efficiency, which is the nodal agency for the grand project.
The scheme -- called Bachat Lamp Yojna -- works like this. The discom in a state decides to implement the scheme. It picks up a financial investor, which lends the upfront finance to buy the CFL bulbs at market price to replace the bulbs in the discom's area. The discom then distributes the bulb to its consumers at Rs 15 apiece and collects the regular bulbs, which it then destroys.
For every ten bulbs that consumers use for a year, a tonne of carbon is prevented from escaping into the atmosphere as CFL bulbs use substantially less power than incandescent ones. For every tonne of carbon saved, the Bureau of Energy Efficiency, acting as the anchor, gets a carbon certificate from the UN, which it then hands over to the investor.
The investor sells the carbon credit in the international market where buyers -- such as manufacturers and power producers in Europe -- buy the certificates to meet the greenhouse gas emission reduction targets the countries have set for them. At present, each certificate sells at around 10-12 Euros in the international spot market.
BEE estimates that investors will be able to recover the rest of the Rs 85 per bulb by 5-6 years and by the 7th year, earn some on the top. BEE has in its scheme ensured that the CFL bulbs are of a standard that they last that long.
Several states and cities have been ready to take advantage of the scheme the moment it becomes operational. Kerala is one such state. It has already found investors and tied up with manufacturers to distribute roughly 1.5 crore bulbs in the state. In anticipation of the project clearance, it has begun distribution of the energy saving bulbs to consumers.
States like Uttarakhand and Punjab and cities like Hyderabad are also ready to roll out the scheme within a month.
The project has got clearance as a "programme for activities' under the UN system which allowed BEE to make the one-time investment of resources and time to get a clearance for the scheme which the discom or investors can take advantage of as they get on board any time later. BEE estimates it cost them about Rs 1 crore to get the clearance and three years of painstaking background work which included the time taken to study the standalone pilot projects in Yamunangar and Vishakapatnam to finetune the scheme.
Buoyed by the speed at which they have been able to get the green light for the project from UN, BEE has begun discussions on the next quantum leap which could save even more power for the country and generate a substantially higher number of carbon credits -- putting Indian households on to LED lamps.
CFL bulb scheme will be world's biggest carbon credit project - India - The Times of India
