In a bid to make municipal waste-to-power projects more attractive, Minister for Non-Conventional Energy Sources Villas Muttemwar Tuesday announced a 50 percent subsidy for such projects.

"Fifty percent of the subsidy will henceforth be given to energy projects based on municipal solid waste immediately after disbursement of the first loan installment as contribution towards equity," the minister said during a brainstorming session on renewable energy here.

"This is for the first time that a subsidy is being used for reducing the equity burden of the investor," Muttemwar said. The aim is to help reduce municipal solid waste, which remains a major problem in every city, he added.

The minister unveiled plans to promote use of renewable energy through alternative fuel systems or devices for stationery, portable and transport applications.

To convert the country from a net importer to a net exporter of renewable energy products and services by 2022, Muttemwar said efforts would be made in close concert with corporate, scientific and technical institutions in order to make the domestic new renewable energy industry globally competitive.

Currently, India stands fifth in the world in wind energy after Germany, the US, Spain and Denmark, with 3,600 MW installed capacity. It ranks fourth after Japan, the US and Germany in photovoltaic annual production capacity of 36 MW and ranks second after China with 3.7 million family-size biogas plants.

Under a roadmap to step up the use of non-conventional energy sources, India aims to provide grid quality electricity by 2009 to 25,000 remote villages, which are not likely to be connected to an electricity grid and can benefit only through use of renewable energy sources.

To achieve this task, the minister called for a public-private partnership