Tata Power, WBC for Sustainable Development to Accelerate Business Action on SDGs for Electric Utilities

Tata Power and World Business Council for Sustainable Development have come together to accelerate business action on SDGs for electric utilities.

With the recently concluded COP26 reiterating the significance of the immediate and just transition to clean energy to meet the Paris Agreement goals, the electric utility sector holds critical responsibility to shape the future of sustainable energy.

In line with this critical agenda, Tata Power in collaboration with World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD) India, organized a global virtual event on ‘Accelerating business action in line with SDGs, with focus on electric utilities’ to spearhead collective action and maximize progress.

The event highlighted the key findings from WBCSD’s report on SDG Sector Roadmap for electric utilities, which was released in March 2021. The roadmap brought together 11 global power utilities (ACCIONA, Celsia, CLP, EDF, EDP, Eletrobras, Enel, ENGIE, Iberdrola, Kansai Electric Power), with Tata Power representing India, to explore and develop a joint global vision on how the Power sector can best actualize & implement the SDGs through collaboration, innovation, and leveraging its influence.

Speaking at the event, Dr. Praveer Sinha, CEO & MD, Tata Power said, “Tata Power has been instrumental in designing the structured SDG roadmap for electric utilities with WBCSD along with 10 global power utility companies. Tata Power has set up an ambitious roadmap to implement 10 of 17 SDGs, which reflects its commitments made in the spirit of the recently concluded COP26. The core business and CSR SDGs have shaped Tata Power’s transformation journey as a responsible Utility of the future and influenced key strategic decisions to further energy transition.

Our efforts on decarbonization, leveraging digital technology, and decentralization will play a critical role in taking forward our SDG goals and implementing them in this decade. Today we have a portfolio of 32% clean energy and we aim to reach 80% by 2030. Tata Power has already committed to becoming carbon-neutral before 2050. We are working towards achieving this goal much earlier.

During COP26, the Prime Minister of India spoke about the mid-term goal of achieving 500GW non-carbon generation by 2030. I am sure that the electric utilities and the government stakeholders together will play a critical role in achieving this ambitious target”

During the inaugural session, James Gomme, Director, People, and Society, WBCSD, said, “We began the Electric utility SDG roadmap a couple of years ago, bringing together a group of leading electric utilities who were already moving the needle in their ways on achieving the SDG goals. We are now operationalizing that roadmap and would like to thank Tata Power for its leadership in initiating a platform for evangelizing the SDG roadmap for the Indian landscape.”

Over the years, Tata Power has been committed to sustainable growth, resource conservation, energy efficiency, and habitat protection. It has won the best Environment Social and Governance (ESG) disclosure at the Investor Relations Award 2020 and has ranked 13th in India’s most sustainable companies with an A+ rating by BW Business World and Sustain lab Paris.