India among leaders in green jobs generation, creates employment for 8.63 lakh in 2021

The number of countries participating in the renewable energy market is increasing but most of the jobs created to date have been in a relatively small number of countriesIn 202021 India created 863000 green jobs of which 217000 were in solar photovoltaic vertical and 414000 in hydropower a joint report published by International Renewable Energy Agency and the International Labour Organization titled Renewable Energy and Jobs Annual Review 2022 saidChina Brazil the US and European Union were the other top green jobs generators during the periodThis joint report presents employment statistics for several leading countries as well as a few other selected countries with a focus on China Brazil India the United States and members of the European UnionIn total 127 million green jobs were generated in 20202021 of which China created 54 million jobs up from 47 million the previous year The joint report said the bulk of renewable energy employment is in Asian countries which accounted for 636 per cent of these jobs in 2021Jobs in solar photovoltaic PV in 2021 the fastestgrowing sector accounted for more than a third of the total renewable energy workforceAlso Read Baby girl injured after monkey tries to snatch her from her mother in ThaneIndia added 103 GW of solar PV capacity in 2021 up from 42 GW installed in 2020The Indian government imposed import duties of 40 per cent on all modules and 25 per cent on all cells effective April 2022 replacing 15 per cent safeguard duties that had been levied on PV imports from China and Malaysia the joint report saidIt also introduced a productionlinked incentive PLI scheme to boost domestic manufacturing of highefficiency modules This offers financial support for project developers who commit to setting up production facilities along the value chainCreating a vertically integrated domestic value chain including polysilicon and wafer manufacturing which India currently does not have could be key to increasing competitiveness and easing concerns about international price fluctuations commodity shortages and supply chain disruptions it saidWorldwide the solar vertical scored a new record in 2021 producing 1328 GW of solar PV capacity installations up from 1256 GW in 2020 with many countries including India setting new annual recordsFurther the joint report estimates global employment in renewable energy by 2030 under an ambitious energy transition scenario with frontloaded investments at 139 millionIn India Indias goal towards 500 GW of nonfossilfuel energy sources by 2030 could create 34 million new job opportunities of short or long duration or about 1 million direct fulltime equivalents the report addedFor the record at the COP26 summit at Glasgow in late 2021 Prime Minister Narendra Modi committed to an ambitious fivepart Panchamrit pledge including reaching 500 GW of nonfossil electricity capacity to generate half of all energy requirements from renewables to reduce emissions by 1 billion tons by 2030India also aims to reduce the emissions intensity of GDP by 45 per cent Finally India commits to netzero emissions by 2070Most would be in the localised deployment of DRE This goal can be achieved with continuous deployment sufficient skills development upgrading and retraining and enhancement of domestic manufacturing of various components it saidIn the wind energy sector too India was a leading installer in 20202021Coming to hydropower capacity worldwide expanded by 25 GW with China alone adding almost 21 GW Canada India and Vietnam added about 1 GW each and European countries added about 15 GW India accounted for about 18 per cent of global hydropower employment followed by Brazil Viet Nam Pakistan the United States the Russian Federation and Colombia ANI