Ajay Mathur, Director General of India's Bureau of Energy Efficiency (BEE), has been selected for a prestigious award in recognition of his efforts to transform the country's power market.
Mathur has been selected by Energy Efficiency Global International Steering Committee (ISC) for International Energy Efficiency Visionary award, which would be presented at a function in Washington on Tuesday. ISC is an alliance to Save Energy.
Announcing the award, ISC said Mathur, also a member of the Prime Minister's Council on Climate Change, has been instrumental in driving India's market transformation towards energy efficiency.
"His work includes India's standards and labelling programmes for equipment and appliances, its energy conservation building code and programs for industrial energy efficiency and demand-side management in the buildings, lighting, and municipal sectors," it said.
Prior to joining BEE, Mathur, who is a chemical engineer, worked on energy research, financing and implementation; headed the World Bank's Climate Change Team in Washington, and the Energy Engineering Division of TERI (The Energy and Resources Institute) in New Delhi.
He was also president of Suzlon Energy Limited. He is the co-author of three books and lead author of several reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
"This for me is recognition of India's efforts to manage its energy intensity at a stage when energy use is likely to grow many times over," Mathur said. "We continue to analyse energy consumption trends and to deploy lessons from best practices to develop a public policy framework that ensures energy efficiency," he said.
"Through consultations and collaboration with all stakeholders, we aim to rationalise energy consumption at every stage of the growth curve," he added.
The other award winners are: Jimena Bronfman, Chile's deputy minister for energy; Jonas Hafstrom, Swedish ambassador to the US and Dr Joseph Oteng-Adjei, minister for energy, Republic of Ghana.
"The EE Global Plenary Awards Luncheon is designed to celebrate and showcase the 'best of the best' practices in energy efficiency and the visionary policy makers standing behind those successes," noted Alliance president Kateri Callahan.
