The government stands ready to provide subsidies to the renewable energy sector to encourage exploring alternatives to costly fossil fuels, State Minister for Energy and Power Nasrul Hamid said on Sunday.
“We have to take a decision on it. We have to decide about subsidies in rural and urban areas. Otherwise, there might be wastages,” he said.
The state minister spoke at a roundtable on the revised renewable energy policy, at Bidyut Bhaban in the capital.
The Energy and Power magazine organised the discussion in association with the power division and German international cooperation agency GIZ. As of March this year, Bangladesh installed 2.8 million solar home systems, according to Infrastructure Development Company Ltd.
On the renewable energy policy, the state minister said formulating a time-befitting policy is not enough. “We will have to make everybody aware about the need for renewable energy.”
Only 2 per cent of the 6,500MW of the power the country produces daily on an average comes from renewable energy.
The renewable energy sector would not thrive without subsidies, said AR Khan, chairman of Bangladesh Energy Regulatory Commission.
The government would have to provide subsidies to recoup the losses to be incurred for using renewable energy, said Moin Uddin, chairman of Rural Electrification Board.
Mollah Amzad Hossain, editor of the Energy and Power, moderated the discussion
