NEW DELHI: The Energy Transition Advisory Committee (ETAC), which was given the responsibility by the Centre of developing a clean energy transition roadmap, has proposed a ban on diesel-powered fourwheelers in cities with populations of one million or more by 2027.
The team, chaired by former Oil Secretary and Prime Minister’s Advisor Tarun Kapoor, has also recommended against installing any additional diesel-powered city buses in metropolitan areas in order to transition to clean fuel in urban public transport in around ten years.
The recommendation is significant because the Automotive Research Association of India (ARAI) had stated in a September 2022 research that the transportation sector produces up to 20 per cent of particulate matter 2.5 emissions, a major air pollutant. Replacing diesel-powered vehicles in intra-city transportation with electric vehicles (EVs) will also lessen reliance on expensive imported fossil fuels.
Cities with a million or more people include Lucknow, Kanpur, Bareilly, Nasik, Thane, Nagpur, Gwalior, Chennai, Madurai, and Coimbatore. The most polluted is the Delhi NCR region, Mumbai, Kolkata, Patna, Kanpur, and Hyderabad. The Government has prioritised the transition of public transportation to e-mobility, as evidenced by the fact that approximately 35 per cent of the total $1.3 billion corpus under the Faster Adoption and Manufacturing of Electric Vehicles (FAME)-II scheme is for e-buses and 25 per cent for electric 3-wheelers in public transport.
A parliamentary subcommittee on EVs had recommended the government in March to develop a comprehensive national strategy on electric vehicles that incorporates state-level and worldwide best practices.
