Gyanesh Pandey of Bihar’s Husk Power receives the ‘Ashden Award for Sustainable Energy’

Gyanesh Pandey of Bihar’s Husk Power receives the ‘Ashden Award for Sustainable Energy’

London: latest reports from UK and India mention that two companies from India – Abellon Clean Energy Ltd. and Husk Power Systems have been declared winners of this year’s ‘Ashden Awards for Sustainable Energy’ at an Awards ceremony in London addressed by Greg Barker, UK Government Minister for Climate Change.

The Prince of Wales, Patron of the Ashden Awards, recently congratulated the international winners in a meeting and said “The Ashden Awards show what it is possible to do now in saving resources and cutting emissions. They remind us how, as individuals, we can make a huge difference to the world in which we live. In a nutshell, they remind us that acting locally is, in fact, acting globally.”

The purpose of the Ashden Awards, world’s most prestigious green energy awards is to highlight practical solutions to combat climate change and meet the energy needs of the poor, in the developing world and in the UK. Abellon Clean Energy Ltd from Gujarat has been awarded œ20,000 for producing biomass pellets from crop waste.

Husk Power Systems from Bihar was awarded œ20,000 for providing remote villages in Bihar with clean, reliable electricity supply, using locally available material – rice husks. Husk Power has thus far built 65 plants generating electricity from gas produced by rice husks and other biomass waste. The electricity is then distributed via Husk Power’s local grids, to around 180,000 off-grid villagers in Bihar. According to its founder, Gaynesh Pandey ‘We have set up training programmes that takes people from rural areas without education and converts them into skilled workers’.

As for the Gujarat based Abellon, it currently produces over 65,000 tonnes of biomass pellets a year and aims to open two more pellet plants in Gujarat in the next five years, trebling its production, and expanding operations into international markets.