Recent trends in sustainable development of renewable energy

Sustainable development is the optimum use of natural resources and adoption of advanced technologies. Solar power in India has an ambitious target and is expected to achieve grid parity by 2022. The national grid is a hybrid AC/DC transmission system. This operates synchronously with five regions including the North-East with 765kV and 400kV AC with +/- 500kV HVDC lines and back-to-back links. Renewable energy sources viz. wind power integration pose technical challenges to the grid, including reactive power and stability. Hybrid AC/DC Micro grid consists of conventional AC grid in combination with a DC grid. Power sources to the Micro grid can be any combination of renewable sources. An emerging trend is that home loads are moving towards DC. Transport sector is witnessing the growth of hybrid electric cars and buses. Electric buses run on Li-ion batteries due to their technical advantages. Alternatively, Ultra capacitors are used when fast-charging is required. Energy-efficiency is becoming more relevant in all areas eg. Motors and transformers. The Indian Standard for distribution transformers has been revised in Nov. 2014 to bring it on par with corresponding International Standards.