A memorandum of understanding has been signed between the Indian Renewable Energy Development Agency Ltd. and the U.S. Export-Import Bank to cooperate on clean energy investment. The memo is intended to establish a framework for the joint financing of creditworthy entities for renewable energy projects and to facilitate the export of goods and services of U.S. origin or manufacture in India.                                                                                                  

Indian Railways is gearing up for another phase of reforms, including expanding the list of areas where foreign direct investment will be invited, identifying at least 50 projects to be commissioned on a public-private partnership and finalizing a fiscal road map that will shape its budget formulations over the next five years.    

Petroleum and Natural Gas Minister Dharmendra Pradhan wants to make India a refining and petrochemicals hub and is wooing international energy majors such as Saudi Aramco and Sabic to invest in India's refining and petrochemicals sector. "I'm asking energy majors to tie up with companies in India to set up...large-scale capacities and use India as a base for further exports to Japan, Korea, China and other South East Asian countries, which are the markets for these products,"Pradhan told HT.   

The Cabinet has approved the launch of an Integrated Power Development Scheme with three major objectives: Strengthening of sub-transmission and distribution networks in urban areas; metering of distribution transformers, feeders and consumers in urban areas; and IT enablement of the distribution sector and strengthening of the distribution network.

The Government has approved a $6.9 billion rural electrification plan, with components to separate agriculture and non-agriculture feeders facilitating judicious accounting of supply to agricultural and non-agricultural consumers in rural areas, Union Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said.