India hopes to attract over $4bln in green energy

India is hoping to attract investments of more than $4 billion in renewable energy over the next 5-7 years, as it prepares to unveil a new biofuels policy within a month, renewable energy minister Vilas Muttemwar said.

"A lot of scope is there in the coming days for renewable energy... According to our information, nearly 200 billion rupees ($4.3 billion) is the investment we are expecting in five to seven years," he said during Reuters Global Environment Summit.

The investments span solar, hydro, wind and biofuel energy.India aims to generate 25,000 megawatts of power from renewable energy over the next four years, more than double the current generation level of 12,000 MW.

Only three percent of India's total power mix is now from renewables, and developing this sector is at the centre of India's national plan on climate change which does not commit to any emission targets.

The country aims to lift the level of biofuel that has to be mixed in petrol and diesel to 20 percent by 2017 from the present level of five percent.Muttemwar said that although the targetted blending level would be increased over the next decade, the policy would ensure it would not be at the expense of food.

"The prime minister has very categorically advised us that no food for fuel, and we are not encouraging that kind of thing in ethanol generation," he said, referring to usage of sugarcane crop for biofuel.

"Wherever there is a surplus...and sometimes what happened is that there is a surplus crop in sugarcane....only then farmers have the alternative to go for ethanol."

Muttemwar said the government was carrying on research on the wild plant jatropha and other varieties to identify a suitable non-edible oil-bearing plant that could be grown across nearly 65 million hectares (163 million acres) of wasteland.