Electricity demand rising at 7%

Ramani KANGARAARACHCHI

The electricity demand in Sri Lanka is increasing at a rate of 7 percent and the government's target is to manage the demand to maintain the business-as-usual demand increase by 10 percent by 2020. Executive Director, Energy Forum of Sri Lanka Asoka Abeygunawardana said.

Submitting a research paper for the symposium on "Facing Contemporary Development Challenges of Sri Lanka" recently he said the country is planning to maintain a 40 percent share of renewable energy in Sri Lanka until 2020 by tapping non-conventional renewable energy resources such as bio mass, wind, solar and ocean energy. Further, the government has indicated its commitment to achieve carbon neutral growth in the power sector by 2020 and to follow a carbon emissions reduction pathway after 2030.

He said Sri Lanka's per capita energy consumption is 0.4 toe which is far below the average of 1.2 toe for lower middle income countries.

Though there is a carbon space for Sri Lanka to emit more in the context of ecological justice, the government has recognized the importance of deviating from the fossil fuel dominant business-as-usual generation expansion due to non-availability of coal reserves in Sri Lanka as it is committed to take climate change issues on moral grounds.