Highlighting Women-Led Clean Energy Solutions in India

Co-authored with Akanksha Golchha

NRDC and partners are organizing a two-day webinar, Women-Led Clean Energy Solutions, to highlight technologies that enhance energy access, improve livelihood options, and create jobs. India’s tremendous climate and clean energy ambitions have the power to truly transform how people use energy in India’s villages. And decentralized renewable energy, which is usually small scale and generated close to the point of use, benefits entire households in many ways, maximizing the impact of clean energy. Empowering rural women, who are often engaged in agricultural and entrepreneurial activities, with clean energy generation at the village level can truly improve energy access and improve livelihoods. Adoption of local climate-friendly clean energy solutions can also help address the ongoing challenges of reliability, quality and affordability of energy in rural areas. Interventions, such as large-scale adoption of decentralized renewable energy, can make clean energy accessible to all while also meeting climate commitments.

Self-Employed Women’s Association (SEWA) and NRDC are implementing effective clean energy interventions through a joint initiative: Hariyali Green Villages. Now active in 10 villages in Gujarat and Rajasthan, this initiative aims to accelerate the uptake of clean energy by supporting comprehensive policy and market solutions to reduce energy poverty and improve livelihoods in rural India. Hariyali Green Villages initiative champions the role of women in the clean energy supply chain and enables them to become the frontrunners for clean energy adoption. NRDC and SEWA work closely with the Association of Renewable Energy Agencies of States, Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (AREAS-MNRE) to focus on policy solutions, and with Clean Energy Access Network (CLEAN) to draw synergies in building a clean energy ecosystem and upscale deployment of decentralized renewable energy solutions on ground.

With this backdrop, NRDC, AREAS-MNRE, SEWA, and CLEAN are organizing a two-day webinar on “Women-Led Efficient and Clean Energy Solutions in India: Discussion with the Farmers” from 22^nd to 23^rd March, 2022 from 4:00-6:00 pm IST / 6:30-8:30 AM ET.

The webinar will provide a platform for farmers from states across India to discuss clean energy and climate friendly technologies that they can adopt to enhance energy security, improve livelihood options and protect the environment. Over two days or remote and hybrid discussions, panelists will cover central and state level policies and incentives for clean energy interventions and dive into the operational and financial aspects of clean technologies and highlight farmers’ perspectives regarding on the ground successes and key bottlenecks.

The webinar will feature solutions including:

• Enhancing Use of Clean Energy for Irrigation
• Reducing energy expenses through efficient appliances
• Enhancing circularity through clean fuels
• Reducing heat stress through cool roofs
• Digitalization for end-to-end solar pump management

The detailed agenda for the webinar is available here. Interested participants can register for the sessions here.

Akanksha Golchha is the Clean Energy Access Lead (Consultant) with NRDC