Govt mulls sops for adhering to star rating

Manufacturers of air-conditioners, refrigerators, power distribution transformers and tubelights have to mandatorily carry the star label for energy efficiency giving the consumption details with effect from January 1 next year, according to Bureau of Energy Efficiency energy economist Sandeep Garg.

Interacting with the media on the sidelines of a seminar on ‘Energy and Climate Change’ organised by the European Union in Hyderabad, he said the government was contemplating giving a tax incentive to companies sticking to the star rating. At present, appliances including a-cs, refrigerators, tubelights, transformers are given a star rating on a scale of 1 to 5. The highest efficient products get a 5 star.

According to him, products with 5 star rating would attract nil tax while there is a proposal to collect 4, 8 and 12 per cent on the appliances which are rated with 4, 3 and 2 stars respectively. “Tax rates will decrease with the increase in the rating,” he said adding that the finance ministry would take the final call on the interest rates.

This would be an incentive for the manufacturing sector and it is hoped that the benefit would be passed on to the consumers. The appliance manufacturing companies would be slapped with a penalty if they do not comply with the labelling norms.

Garg said the bureau could save 2,000 Mw in about two years by implementing energy efficiency norms and had set a target to save 10,000 Mw by the end of 2011 by bringing 31 products on to the energy efficiency platform.

It has also asked power utilities across the country to go in for star labelled transformers to bring down the transmission and distribution losses. “The life cycle costs decrease and the additional investment would be recovered through energy efficiency,” he said.