The government of India has signed a pact with Japan’s New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO) to deliver renewable energy management solutions at mobile towers.
This is the first project under India-Japan bilateral co-operation in the energy sector, according to official sources.
In India, mobile towers are growing in number with the introduction of Lithium Ion batteries and application of Energy Management System (EMS) from Japan, stated NEDO sources.
This project promotes technology that helps reduce diesel consumption and huge electricity supply needed for telecom towers.
On simulating the system in four lakhs of telecom towers a 50 percent energy conservation and a 10 lakh kiloliters reduction in diesel fuel is possible, says the statement.
GTL Infrastructure and Viom Networks will provide the telecom infrastructure for the project. The companies will allow using their towers for demonstration purpose.
The group is planning a project demonstration in a total of 62 sites in the outskirts of major cities and other parts of India. Twenty sites are short-listed for EMS demonstration and 52 sites are chosen for photo catalyst paint demonstration.
The DoT has asked mobile companies to enable electricity supply to 50 per cent of rural and 20 per cent of urban towers through a hybrid system combining grid power and renewable energy by 2015.
Further, DoT has set a target to cover 75 per cent of rural and 33 per cent of urban telecom towers by 2020.
The partnership with NEDO will help the telcos achieve these targets.
Organizations participating in the NEDO project are Department of Economic Affairs (DEA), Ministry of New and renewable Energy, Department of Telecommunication, NEDO and Indian mobile tower companies GTL infrastructure and Viom Networks.