India‘s Per Capita Energy Consumption Lowest In The World  Prithviraj Chavan |
According to Prithviraj Chavan, the Minister of State for Earth Sciences, India's per capita energy consumption was "the lowest" in the world and the nation "can defend its interests".
Chavan, addressing a gathering on Earth Sciences Foundation Day at Vigyan Bhavan in New Delhi, said that the climate change has now come into international diplomatic domain and India needed to carry out research and study to put its stance at the international level.
"Climate change debate was at forefront of the G8 submits in Italy this month. As of now, our per capita energy consumption is the lowest and India can defend its interests related to energy consumption so that nobody can cap our development only if we understand science," he said.
"There are concerns about changes in ocean levels, changes in monsoon cycle due to the global warming. And to estimate effects of climate change and possible threats, we need to generate our own data, carry out research works," Chavan said.
He said the ministry has set up the Centre for Climate Change at Pune, which would be operational by September 2009, to address climate change related issues.
The ministry has fully geared up to modernise India Meteorology Department (IMD) so that weather predictions could be done with high degree of accuracy.
K. Kasturirangan, member of Planning Commission, gave away the National Awards in Ocean Science and Technology and Atmospheric Science and Technology to scientists.
