The third day of India Energy Week 2026 underscored the urgent need to align policy, data, technology, and investment to meet India’s surging energy demands. Government, industry, and global leaders laid out clear pathways for a secure, resilient, and inclusive energy future.
At the Global Energy Conclave, sessions marking the release of the IEA India Bioenergy Market Report and the 5th edition of the PPAC Journal highlighted India’s growing bioenergy potential. Neeraj Mittal, Secretary, Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas, said India’s bioenergy sector “has the potential to grow significantly faster than overall energy demand and emerge as a key pillar of energy security, emissions reduction and rural development.”
“India’s energy consumption is in the lower half globally on a per capita basis, but its growth rate is almost twice the world average. In the next decade, India’s energy growth could outstrip global growth by a factor of two or more,” Mittal added.
He cited the ethanol blending programme, noting that blending has risen from 1.4% in 2014 to nearly 20% today, with similar targets set for biodiesel, compressed biogas, and sustainable aviation fuel.
Paolo Frankl, Head of the Renewable Energy Division at the International Energy Agency, noted that India has tripled its consumption of modern bioenergy since 2020 and could double deployment again by 2030 if policy implementation is strengthened.
In the Leadership Spotlight Session on energy data, Pankaj Jain, Former Secretary, Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas, warned against reactive planning: "Energy cannot play catch-up. Energy has to anticipate.” He stressed integrating data across petroleum, power, coal, and gas to guide macroeconomic forecasting and infrastructure prioritisation.
On artificial intelligence in upstream energy, Rajarshi Gupta, MD & CEO of ONGC Videsh Limited, said India is undergoing a fundamental shift in how exploration data is created, shared, and used, emphasizing the need to break silos and unlock value from AI-driven decision-making.
In a session on solar and wind, Santosh Kumar Sarangi, Secretary, Ministry of New and Renewable Energy, said India must move beyond capacity expansion to focus on grid integration and domestic manufacturing, noting that non-fossil fuel capacity has reached 267 GW.
At a panel on coal’s role in India’s energy mix, Vikram Dev Dutt, Secretary, Ministry of Coal, said affordable and dependable baseload power remains imperative as India works to triple per capita energy consumption, even while renewables scale up.
In the spotlight on green hydrogen, Abhay Bakre, Mission Director, National Green Hydrogen Mission, said India’s green hydrogen ecosystem is moving decisively from ambition to execution, supported by competitive renewable energy costs, policy certainty, and global partnerships.
As the day concluded, India Energy Week 2026 reaffirmed that the nation’s energy transition will not follow a single pathway, but will be defined by coordinated policy, innovation, and collaboration. With clear direction and stakeholder alignment, India is positioning itself as a central force shaping the future of global energy systems.
