Central government offices must switch to energy efficient appliances

The Centre has directed all central government buildings across India to switch over to LED based lightings and energy efficient cooling equipments to ensure savings in costs and energy consumption, an official said here on Friday.

The guidelines of the Ministry of Finance - issued last week - will be implemented by the Department of Expenditure through the Energy Efficiency Services Ltd (EESL), a joint venture of public sector undertakings under the Ministry of Power.

It said that majority of the government buildings were old constructions and therefore consume large amount of energy, mandating installation of energy efficient appliances therein.

"Any central government office can now directly contact us for retrofitting of inefficient appliances with efficient alternates," EESL Managing Director Saurabh Kumar said, welcoming the new central directive.

He said the EESL was the implementation agency for the Buildings Energy Efficiency Programme launched in May this year by Union Power Minister Piyush Goyal.

Under the programme the EESL plans to bring in investments of around Rs 1000-crore covering more than 10,000 large government and private buildings by 2020.

"It is estimated that about one crore LED lights, 1.50 million energy efficient ceiling fans and 150,000 energy efficient airconditioners would be retrofitted by EESL in these buildings, besides offering services for centralized AC systems, energy audits and New Generation Energy Management Systems in the buildings," Kumar said.

The EESL's BEEP has two business models for implementing the energy efficiency projects intended to enhance the savings portfolio and ensure energy security for all citizens.

Till date, the EESL has already retrofitted energy efficient appliances in 28 buildings like NITI Aayog, Nirman Bhavan, Sardar Patel Bhavan, Shastri Bhavan, Jammu & Kashmir Assembly, Jammu Secretariat, Vidyut Bhavan, Rajiv Chowk Metro Station, among others.

It has installed around 94,000 LED lights, 3000 energy efficient airconditioners and more than 400 energy efficient ceiling fans in these locations where the savings are estimated to be over 11.03 MU.

The EESL is a joint venture of NTPC, Power Finance Corporation, Rural Electrification Corporation and POWERGRID under the Minstry of Power.

--IANS

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