India’s energy intensity improved in FY24: Stats ministry report

India's energy intensity has improved

The amount of energy spent to generate a rupee of GDP, also called energy intensity, improved further in FY24 compared with the previous fiscal, according to a report released by Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation on March 25.

“The overall Energy intensity has witnessed a slight improvement during FY 2023-24. In FY 2023-24, it took 0.2180 Mega Joules of energy to generate 1 INR of GDP as compared to 0.2192 MJ per INR of GDP in FY 2022-23,” the ministry stated.

The improvement has come as the country’s industrial sector witnessed a significant lowering of energy spent from 361.5 megajoules to 284.2 megajoules.

An improvement in energy intensity is an important goal as the country tries to achieve its net zero target by 2070.

A study published by Reserve Bank of India researchers had found that India’s energy efficiency, characterised by amount of energy used to perform a task, at 1.9 percent per annum had improved faster than the global average of 1.4 percent between 2000 and 2023.

It had also noted that despite faster growth adding to more emissions, improvements in energy intensity over the last decade had helped save 399 million tonnes of emissions.

“Going ahead, the emission factor effect is expected to play a more prominent role as renewables increasingly replace fossil fuels and green hydrogen usage expands in industries,” RBI researchers said.

The MoSPI report highlights that India’s energy is still heavily import dependent, with over a quarter of India’s energy serviced by imports.

“India’s dependency on the energy Imports has remained significant. During FY 2023- 24, the Import-dependency of Crude Oil was close to 89%, whereas the same for 46.60% for Natural Gas and 25.86% for Coal,” it noted.

India’s per capita energy consumption has grown by 25 percent over the last decade, while renewable share has increased, India still has a long way to go to reach its potential.