Low Carbon Energy Programme and Policy Lead

UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office (UK FCO)

Chinmaya has focussed a large part of his career on climate mitigation and adaptation. He was associated with the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), where he worked to strengthen the US Government's clean energy partnership programs with both India and other South Asian countries through policy advocacy and joint program activities. Mr. Acharya managed the $65 million South Asia Regional Initiative for Energy (SARI/Energy) Program, a multilateral energy cooperation program, between Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and the United States Governments.

Mr. Acharya’s key accomplishments included identifying, assessing and addressing key policy and program impediments vis-a-vis regional cooperation in the areas of Energy Efficiency, Rural Energy Access, Energy Trade, and Renewable Energy. On a previous assignment at USAID, he led the $10 Million, Indo-US bilateral program portfolio on Water-Energy co-management. He also spearheaded advisory support to Ministry of Power, Government of India, for formulating a national level program strategy on Demand Side Management in the agriculture sector.

Mr. Chinmaya has also worked with NGOs on climate change adaptation programs particularly on forestry, watershed management, livelihoods and allied activities.