On 2 June, the ClimateFiGS speaker series is hosting Deepak Sharma for a lunchtime talk on India's strategic energy Public Sector Undertakings (PSUs).
Date: 2 June 2026
Time: 12:00-13:30
Location: REC - B9.22 (additional live stream via Microsoft Teams)
How can institutions that remain central to fossil fuel production also become key actors in the energy transition?
This presentation by Deepak Sharma explores that question through the case of India’s strategic energy public sector undertakings. These state-owned enterprises sit at the heart of India’s energy system, spanning coal mining, oil and gas production, refining, gas transmission, and power generation, while also becoming increasingly involved in solar, wind, green hydrogen, and pumped storage.
key players in india's energy transition
The presentation will open up wider questions about public ownership, climate governance, and industrial transformation. India’s energy PSUs occupy a distinctive position: they are major economic actors, large employers, and central instruments of national energy policy. This makes them an important site for examining how energy security, decarbonisation, public investment, and just transition concerns intersect. Rather than treating the energy transition as a purely technological or market-led process, the event will consider what publicly owned enterprises can reveal about the political and institutional conditions needed for a credible transition.
About Deepak Sharma
Deepak Sharma is an energy and climate policy researcher and an independent consultant with the International Institute for Sustainable Development, based in the Netherlands. His work focuses on the political economy of energy transition, with expertise in tracking fossil fuel and clean energy subsidies at national and sub-national level, the energy transition performance of state-owned enterprises, and techno-economic analysis of clean energy technologies. He combines quantitative modelling with policy analysis to inform decarbonization strategies across developed and emerging economies. He holds a PhD and MPhil from the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay and an MBA from the TERI School of Advanced Studies, New Delhi.