Dr. Pramod Deo is the longest serving electricity regulator
in India. Dr. Deo joined MERC as Member on April 29, 2002.
He was elevated as Chairman on February 11, 2005.
Dr. Deo holds a post-graduate degree in Physics, a doctoral
degree in Infrastructure Economics and has done post-doctoral
research in Energy Policy and Economics. He is also co-author
of three books on energy planning, energy management and
regulatory practice.
As an energy expert he has been able to contribute significantly
to MERC's orders on utility tariffs, 'Pune Model' which
is based on utilization of decentralized generation to meet
the shortage of power in the city, power from renewable
sources of energy, captive power, etc.
Before joining MERC as Member in 2002, he has acquired 30
years of experience in the Indian Administrative Service
(IAS) of which more than 20 years of experience has been
at both policy and project management levels in the energy
sector. He has worked in the power sector in the Ministry
of Power, Government of India, Department of Energy, Government
of Maharashtra and international institutions like UNEP
and AIT.
In the Department of Energy, Government of Maharashtra his
major contribution was drafting the State Reform Bill 2000
to enable the state government to set in motion the process
of unbundling the vertically integrated state monopoly (MSEB),
its corporatisation and eventual privatization. During this
period he also held the concurrent charge of Environment
Department.
He was on 'foreign assignment' with the UNEP Risoe Centre
on Energy, Climate and Sustainable Development (URC) , located
in Denmark as Senior Energy Economist for five years (1993
- 98). On behalf of the Centre he also worked for UNDP on
the development of Global Environment Facility (GEF) capacity
building proposals to equip Egypt, Jordan and Malaysia to
respond effectively to the Framework Convention on Climate
Change (FCCC). All the energy-environment projects and climate
change mitigation studies extensively covered power sector
reforms, energy efficiency and conservation options.
He is the founding Director of state and national level
energy institutions, namely the Maharashtra Energy Development
Agency (1986-88) and the Energy Management Centre (1989-93),
set up to promote renewable energy and energy efficiency
respectively. The latter has been upgraded under Energy
Conservation Act 2001 to the Bureau of Energy Efficiency
(BEE), a statutory body to implement the new law.
He worked as a short-term consultant to the World Bank in
1993 and as a Research Engineer at the Asian Institute of
Technology, Bangkok from 1985 to 86.
Dr. Deo is a recipient of the World Wind Energy Award 2005
from World Wind Energy Association for his outstanding achievement
in the dissemination of wind energy. Confederation of Indian
Industry (CII) selected him for their national award "Distinguished
Personality - Energy Management" for the year 2006.
