All that was discussed in the House through the day
The Central Electricity Authority vide an advisory dated 20.01.2023 suggested that no retirement or repurposing of coal-based power stations be done before 2030, RK Singh, Union Minister of New and Renewable Energy and Power, told the Rajya Sabha.
The Authority considered the expected energy demand scenario and availability of capacity in future.
Thermal Power Plants were also advised to implement renovations and modernisation and life extension of their units for running up to 2030 and beyond or operating in two shift mode to facilitate Solar and Wind energy integration in to the grid, wherever feasible.
Presently, there is no specific information available on the climate hunger crisis in the country, Narendra Singh Tomar, Union Minister of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare told the Lok Sabha.
Climate change events like extreme weather, irregular rainfall and drought, are known to have an impact on foodgrain production. The central government is implementing the National Mission for Sustainable Agriculture to deal with the impact of climate change in food grains production, the minister said.
The National Agricultural Research System, under the aegis of Indian Council of Agricultural Research, agriculture ministry, has released 2,279 high yielding varieties / hybrids of field crops for different agro-climatic conditions during 2014-15 to 2022- 23 to address the impact of climate change, Tomar added.
Of these varieties, 1,888 are biotic and abiotic stress tolerant and 217 are less water requiring / drought / heat / moisture stress tolerant, he said.
Inter-ministerial central teams were constituted to visit the states affected by the cyclones for an on the spot assessment of damages, according to information provided by the Union Ministry of Home Affairs, Tomar told the Lok Sabha.
Financial assistance worth Rs 45,654.76 crore was released to states under the National Disaster Response Fund (NDRF) for all notified calamities to 2022-23 from 2018-19.
For undertaking relief measures for all notified calamities, including drought, flood, landslides, cyclones, etc, funds are available with the state government in the form of the State Disaster Response Fund (SDRF).
Additional financial assistance, over and above the SDRF, is considered from the NDRF for natural calamities of severe nature, as per the established procedures, the minister added.
Preliminary studies for nine cities with a population of four million or more indicate a requirement of 18,000 public electric vehicle (EV)charging stations by 2030, showed inputs from the Union Ministry of Power (MoP), Mahendra Nath Pandey, Union Minister of Heavy Industries told the Lok Sabha.
These cities are namely Delhi, Mumbai, Pune, Ahmedabad, Surat, Bengaluru, Chennai, Hyderabad and Kolkata.
The VAHAN portal managed by the Union Ministry of Road Transport and Highways showed that 28,17,554 EVs were operational in the country as of July 31, 2023, the minister said.
There are 9,113 public electric vehicle charging stations operational in the country, according to data from the Bureau of Energy Efficiency under the MoP, Pandey further said. This corresponds to 15,493 EV chargers. Accordingly, the ratio of EVs to public EV chargers in the country comes out to be 182.
So far, 409,000 hectares has been brought under natural farming in eight states — Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Kerala, Himachal Pradesh, Jharkhand, Odisha, Madhya Pradesh and Tamil Nadu — under the Bharatiya Prakritik Krishi Paddhati, Tomar told the Lok Sabha.
Natural farming is chemical free farming based on the integrated agriculture and animal husbandry approach using livestock and local resources and relies on on-farm biomass recycling with a major emphasis on biomass mulching, use of on-farm cow dung-urine formulations from local livestock.
No data is available regarding the number of nomadic tribal people in the country, Pratima Bhoumik, Union Minister of State for Social Justice and Empowerment told the Lok Sabha.
However, earlier, a National Commission for De-notified, Nomadic and Semi-Nomadic Tribes was constituted by the Government of India in February 2014, inter-alia, to prepare a state-wise list of castes belonging to de-notified, nomadic and semi-nomadic Tribes.
A total of 1262 communities were identified across the country, the report found.
India has the highest number of deaths due to liver diseases in 2017, approximately 0.22 million deaths due to cirrhosis and other chronic liver diseases, Mansukh Mandaviya, Union Minister of Health and Family Welfare told the Rajya Sabha.
The data came from The burden of liver cirrhosis in mortality: Results from the global burden of disease study quoted by Indian Council of Medical Research.
The Development of Solar Parks and Ultra Mega Solar Power Projects scheme has an approved allocation of Rs 8,100 crore, Singh told the Rajya Sabha.
The scheme has been extended up to 2025-26 without any additional financial implication. Hence, no additional funds are allotted for extension of the scheme, the minister said.
The Centre has sanctioned 50 solar parks with aggregate capacity of 37,990 Megawatts in 12 states across the country, so far. Against this sanction, 11 parks with an aggregate capacity of 8,521 MW have been completed and seven with an aggregate capacity of 3,985 MW have been partially completed.
In these parks, solar projects of aggregate capacity of 10,237 MW have been developed.
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