India's Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) is pursuing a project aimed at converting biomass, municipal solid wastes, high ash coal and industrial wastes into useful products like electricity, fertilizers and chemicals.
The project of Multi-Feed Gasification Technology will be the first-of-its-kind in the world as only Single-Feed Gasification Technology exists even in developed and few developing countries.
"While it will meet needs of civilian sector also, our aim is to provide green energy for Defence needs where it is required for consumption”, Saraswat said at a daylong workshop on the topic 'Gasification Technologies Applicable to India'.
Highlighting the importance of energy security with reference to Defence forces, the DRDO chief informed that the Indian armed forces were among the largest consumer of energy, bulk of which is required in far flung areas.
"Thus, the transport of fuel is a major issue. We need to have technologies to generate power near the place of its consumption and using sources available nearby linking development with the consumption of power," he said.
The workshop was organised by the Vehicle Research and Development Establishment (VRDE) and DRDO.
The aim of the workshop was to sensitize a cross section of potential industries, academies, research and development organisations in realizing the National Centre of Excellence for Combustion and Gasification (NCECG).
This was conducted over a period of three sessions through invited talks by eminent speakers and panel discussions involving experts in the field.
On this occasion, Principal Scientific Adviser to Government of India Dr R Chidambaram and Research and Information System for Developing Countries (RIS) Chairman Shyam Sharan also addressed the gathering.
National Mission-9 Programme under Climate Change Action Plan of Prime Minister of India clearly envisages building an indigenous technology on Multi-feed (Coal, Biomass, MSW, Petcoke) Gasification Technology plant for power and hydrogen.
A National Centre of Excellence for Combustion and Gasification (NCECG) is being established by Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) at Vehicle Research and Development Establishment (VRDE), Ahmednagar, with the objective of doing a directed research towards this end.
The aim of the centre is to develop and establish clean gasification technologies for converting various feeds which are normally in abundance in the country but so far not used to generate energy. |