The American Chamber of Commerce thematic Luncheon chat was held on Tuesday (May 3) under the theme “Power and Energy”. The chat was one in a series of discussions organized by the chambers with Niro Cooke as the Moderator of the event.

Sri Lanka’s current status on Power and Energy was discussed and debated by the likes of Vidura Ralapanawa (Environmentalist), Dr. Suren Batagoda (Secretary of the Ministry of Power and renewable energy), Dr. Anil Cabraal (Board Member of the Energy Forum and a specialist in Renewable Energy) and Riyaz Sangani (Managing Director of Vidullanka)

“J.P morgan, who is not the biggest environmentalist you can find in this world, recently categorized coal mining in the same group as child labor in activities that they should not fund.”: Vidura Ralapanawa – Environmentalist

Environmentalist Viduara Ralapanawa pointed out that in the recent United States policy, President Barrack Obama will not be extending any state lands for Coal mining anymore. He also noted that Sri Lanka’s neighboring country India is taxing Coal Mining $6-per-ton, investing the money in renewable energy in return.

Vidura Ralapanawa also argued that it is the large coal power plants which have caused the black-outs in the country and questioned how many black-outs were caused by renewable energy.

“If CEB engineers are coming and saying -If we put renewable energy it’s going to create black-outs-, i think I need a whole bottle of Salt not a pinch of salt to take that in”- Vidura Ralapanawa

Dr. Anil Cabraal -a specialist in the field of Renewable Energy stated that if telecom operated the way the CEB is operating the country will still be using land-line phones, waiting for a long 3 years to get a phone connection.

Dr. Suren Batagoda addressed the forum saying that he does not know who is telling the truth and later added that the CEB wants 100% of the country’s energy supply to be on renewable energy.

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