The State Chief Secretary Utpal Kumar Singh inaugurated the one -day awareness workshop on the generation of electricity from the Pirul (dried pine needles) under the State Government’s electricity production policy 2018  in the premises of the Government Inter College at Jaiharikhal in lansdowne on Wednesday. Though the Chief Minister Trivendra Singh Rawat was scheduled to inaugurate it he could not come as his chopper could not fly due to technical faults. The workshop was jointly organised by both the Uttarakhand Renewable Energy Development Agency (UREDA) and the State forest department.

Addressing the workshop, chief secretary said that the first plant for generating power  through Pirul would come up at  Jaiharikhal as per the desire of the Chief Minister. He said that the CM could not have come to inaugurate the workshop as his chopper developed some technical snags. “However, I am assuring all that he would come here soon,” he said. 

He also assured on behalf of the CM that Jaiharikhal Inter College would be developed as a model residential college on the pattern of Netarhat Vidhayalaya, Jharkhand. He further said that with the State Government celebrating this year as employment year while promoting tourism as an industry, self- employment related to tourism industry is all set to play a very crucial role in the State by 2020. 

After inaugurating the awareness workshop, CS inaugurated Ullar Home Aawas in Jharikhal village which came up under the home stay scheme.

The chief project  officer of UREDA, AK Tyagi said that the pirul being found in superabundance in the mountainous area of the State, 6000 power generation units can be established across the State. “ loans would be provided to those interested to establish such units by the banks under MSME policy,” he added.

Notably, the time of  Pirul  collection being from January 15 to June 15, around 40   percent of Pirul can be collected  and be used in the generation of electricity.