In the earlier post on Public Investment for Solar Power I had advocated that the government of India should spend a huge deal of money in research and development of the technology for using solar power.
This is a brief response to a couple of comments to that post. First, let’s recognize that the current state of the art does not allow the harnessing of solar energy on a scale that will make conventional fuels obsolete or even make a significant dent in their demand. That is precisely why more research and development is required. If doing the R&D were cheap and easy, we would not be having this discussion because it would have been done by some enterprising corporation already. The reason I put the figure around US$100 billion is because it is going to be a hard problem — you have to solve all sorts of related issues, from storage technology to fabrication of photo-voltaic devices to the mass manufacture of associated equipment.
Second, public investment does not mean that a bunch of government entities will be doing the R&D. Funding is public but the actual work can be entirely in the private sector. The hard problem is to create the mechanism which would allocate the funds to the most productive teams. One way would be to create an independent authority or an institution along the lines of the National Science Foundation or NASA of the US.
Technology does not spontaneously arise out of thin air. Someone somewhere at some time has to have the will to make the effort to develop it. So far for all practical purposes all the modern technologies are developed in the West, particularly in the US. It is time for us to pause and wonder why it never happens in India. Are Indians incapable of developing technology? Surely they are not dumber than any other large aggregate of people. Are they lacking resources? Not really, because India is a large country, even though it is poor in per capita income and wealth. So what is the missing ingredient? I think it is a lack of vision, a lack of national pride. Sometimes in a dark mood I think that Indians are a nation of followers, not leaders.
Atanu Dey : Life is a Random Draw 
Research and innovation will not flourish in an atmosphere where every outcome is measured in terms of what collective good it serves or is supposed to serve. An efficient, incentive compatible, mechanism for allocating resources to best serve private motives and interests may not be impossible, but it must be invisible!
p.s. Atanu, I have linked to this post on my bog here, and elaborated on my comment. I hope you don’t mind. Thanks.
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Its immaterial weather private agencies are doing R&D and funding is coming from government.
The issues is that money is finite and where to put it for the most return.
Your recommended scales are well off the scales.
Throwing huge amounts of money at a problem does not solve anything.
Saudi Arabia has thrown money into “jumpstarting” defense and aviation with nothing to show for it.
Maruti Udyog project under the beloved gandu family scion was a similar money sink in the 70’s.
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SOLAR power will be the ultinate source of power for mankind. our ancestors realised it long back and the ritual of SURJA PRANAM evolved before start of the day. there is too much research in the field in different developed countries and there is no need of spending money on its research in India which will be mere duplication. our govt can takeup a goal of solar energy utilization target and learn from other countries who have made development of solar power in recent past. One of the ways to develop this power and norish it is to introduce the FEED IN TARIFF as has happened in other countries. little preferential feed in tariff of MNRE has done miracle in hydel and wind power developemt in India. But the same FIT is not helping in development of solar power as the cost of installation of solar power is much higher than the hydel or wind power. over the years the solar power cost will come down with development of new technology/ material and increase in volume of projects. but till that time say around 15 years we have to introduce FIT for solar power or we will miss the buss completely.
There is not much discussion for FIT for solar power in different forum and i will appreciate the topic should get wide attention resulting acceptance of the same by MNRE/ MOP/ GOI
cell 094334 00655
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Atanu, good post, and finally, I can agree with you on some issue (your misguided/uncritical cheer-leading for GMOs notwithstanding) 😉 🙂
It’s really simple: we HAVE TO explore renewable energy resources sooner or later, given that oil and natural gas are finite, and have peaked. So, better sooner than later – that’s the wiser way. Also check out this movie (well, it’s just a trailer for ‘The Power of Community’) about Cuba and how they handled the fossil-fuel crisis. That should provide us with some ideas.
Solar energy is a no-brainer, and if we hadn’t been addicted to oil for so long, and instead, had invested in renewable energy research when Carter installed solar panels on the White House in 1976, it’s a slim possibility that Iraq war wouldn’t have happened.
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Forgot: here’s their website:
http://www.powerofcommunity.org/cm/index.php
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Atanu, Iam a little surprised by your endorsement of a A particular renewable energy source.
I wonder if a better market solution might be to raise the price of existing fuel, so that renewable energy turns out to be more competitive price wise, and stimulates private research into the best form of renewable energy for the country. Why zero-in on solar ? Let the market fight out between solar, wind, nuclear etc. By the way, solar energy is nothing but Sun’s nuclear energy sent to us over millions of miles, so why not harness nuclear energy here itself ? It may have advantages or disadvantages, let the market fight it out.
Another disadvantage of spending lot of money on a particular source is, it doesn’t do anything about conservation or creating efficiencies in the current system in the use of fossil fuels. A carbon tax, by raising the price of carbon, will stimulate conservation and efficiency. Forget carbon “tax” — Heck, we are not even passing the full market price of fuel onto the consumers right now.
If we think that raising the price of fuel might adversely affect the economy, and raise inflationary pressures, then we should be prepared to do some heavy social engineering in terms of energy use. I would say tax the heck out of cars. I agree with you, 1 lakh car is no-no for India. We cannot afford gas guzzler on the road. Tax the heck out of airline travel. Iam sure most people doing air travel today can afford a few more hours of relaxed travelling in a train. I know this is not a “market” solution, but when we are not ready to tax carbon broad based, we should be atleast ready to do some social engineering, and targeted steps at conservation.
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