Public Transport Should Use Biofuels To Cut Fossil Fuel Expense, Stop Pollution: Nitin Gadkari
Road Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari on Monday reiterated the need to promote the use of green fuel like bio-CNG ethanol methanol and electricity. Adoption of such fuels is meant to cut down on the huge expenditure that the State Road Transport Undertakings SRTUs are incurring on conventional fuels.
Road Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari on Monday reiterated the need to promote the use of green fuel like bio-CNG, ethanol, methanol and electricity. The emphasis on the extended use of such sustainable fuels comes as a part of modernising the public transport fleet in India.
Adoption of such fuels is meant to cut down on the huge expenditure that the State Road Transport Undertakings (SRTUs) are incurring on conventional fuels, Gadkari said during UITP¡¯s annual ¡®India Bus Seminar¡¯.
In addition to the reduced cost of fuel bills from such a transition, the bio fuels will also help bring down the sky high pollution levels across several Indian cities, emphasised Gadkari.
Nitin Gadkari (Image: BCCL)
"The minister called for moving on to biofuels, CNG and electricity as transportation fuel," the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways said in a statement. It cited Gadkari, saying "loss in bus service is about Rs 60 crore per year, which can be saved by converting buses into CNG."
The green way forward
In order to portray the workability of such green fuels, Gadkari cited the example of Nagpur, which has started to convert 450 buses from its transport fleet to biofuel-run vehicles. Gadkari confirmed that as many as 90 buses have already been converted to run on the green fuel.
In addition, Gadkari mentioned the efforts being made to produce CNG from sewage water and other biodegradable sources like paddy straw, which can ultimately benefit farmers, transport sector, environment and economy.
(Representative Image: Reuters)
In the statement, Gadkari thus called upon the SRTUs to shift to the use of such fuels for reducing losses incurred on fossil fuels.
For further balancing out the chequebooks through these bus services, Gadkari called for the adoption of the London bus model that brings in private capital for better public transport. Through this, Gadkari highlighted the need for public private partnerships (PPPs).
(With inputs from PTI)
