As temperatures rise across India, so will the demand for cooling. Severe heat waves, responsible for thousands of deaths across India over the last few decades, are increasing with alarming frequency. Soon India could become one of the first places in the world to experience heat waves that break the human survivability limit. Rising heat across India can jeopardize economic productivity.

India’s long-term food security and public health security will depend on a reliable cold chain network. Transporting food and pharmaceutical goods across India requires a system of cold chain refrigeration that works every step of the way. Unlocking opportunities to create a sustainable cooling strategy can help India in its post-COVID recovery by boosting investments, creating jobs, reducing emissions, and securing the supply chains of medical care products, health infrastructure as well as food.

Priority must be given to transitioning to energy-efficient, climate-friendly cooling solutions that do not cause a spike in electricity demand. Sustainable cooling is not just essential for economic growth but is critical for a country’s health, security and productivity.

Leveraging existing schemes, the government can position India as a global hub for green cooling manufacturing. As per an International Energy Agency analysis, the demand for space cooling alone has risen at an average pace of 4 percent per year since 2000, twice as quickly as for lighting or water heating. This offers a great opportunity for India to foster future innovation and investment in the sector by providing a conducive policy environment.

Existing government programs such as Make in India or the Production Linked Incentive (PLI) scheme can be further honed to promote manufacturing of components, refrigerants, and machinery that form an integral part of the cooling value chain. Efforts to this end will help the country meet its growing domestic demand while also enabling it to position itself as a manufacturing hub for cooling technologies.

Sustainable cooling in India

India, recognizing the complex challenges of rising temperatures, was one of the first countries in the world to develop a comprehensive Cooling Action Plan in 2019. The India Cooling Action Plan (ICAP) sets out a long-term vision of ensuring sustainable cooling and thermal comfort for all while securing environmental and socio-economic benefits.

The ICAP recognizes that cooling is a cross-sectoral challenge, and that sustainable delivery of cooling is needed to deliver climate-resilient economic growth. The ICAP’s goals include:

• Reduction of cooling demand across sectors by up to 25 percent by 2037-38;
• Reduction of refrigerant demand by up to 30 percent by 2037-38;
• Reduction of cooling energy requirements by up to 40 percent by 2037-38;
• Recognition of “cooling and related areas” as a key sphere of research under India’s national science and technology program; and
• Training and certification of 100,000 servicing sector technicians by 2022-23 and building synergy with the Skill India Mission.

Cooling demand in India is expected to grow exponentially across all sectors over the coming years. According to ICAP, cooling demand across India is projected to rise at a rate of 15-20 percent annually and aggregated cooling demand will grow to around eight times by 2037-38, as compared to the 2017-18 baseline. Space cooling for buildings has the largest current and projected cooling demand, refrigerant demand, energy consumption and associated greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions as compared to other sectors.

To help India achieve the ICAP’s bold vision while identifying entry points for World Bank sectoral engagement, it commissioned a study in December 2020, with the aim of identifying practical ways to support the implementation of the ICAP, including via identification of the role of concessional finance in delivering cooling solutions. 

The report of the recent study ‘Climate Investment Opportunities in India’s Cooling Sector’ finds that concessional finance by multilateral development banks, financial institutions and the private sector will play a key role in helping India develop financial instruments and innovative models to accelerate the adoption of sustainable cooling measures.

These innovative financial instruments will be crucial to develop and transform the cooling market in India. The study includes a series of roadmaps designed to help achieve sustainable cooling in key ICAP thematic areas, i.e., Space Cooling in Buildings, Cold-Chain and Refrigeration (Agriculture and Health), Passenger Transport Air-Conditioning and Refrigerants.

While progress has been made on ICAP’s short-term recommendations for space cooling, energy standards and policy action, ICAP has faced some challenges in overall implementation. There is an unprecedented opportunity for a transformative change in course to implement a sustainable cooling strategy that will not only save lives but boost India’s economy.

To help India achieve this goal, this study attempts to develop an actionable roadmap – comprising policy, investment and knowledge guidelines – to help guide the implementation of India’s ICAP. The study was conducted in partnership with environmental and climate-solution consulting groups, Iora Ecological Solutions, Energe-se, Tessol and Vertiver.

This study focused on ICAP’s thematic cross-sectoral areas including space cooling in buildings, cold chain and refrigeration, transport air-conditioning and refrigerants. The refrigerants sector covers the ICAP thematic areas of Research and Development (R&D), refrigerant demand and indigenous production, and the refrigeration and air-conditioning servicing sector. The authors identified specific and scalable interventions that can be achieved through partnerships with various actors to help implement the ICAP goals.

For some sectors, the study analysis revealed data for investment opportunities, job potential and climate impacts of a sustainable cooling strategy. The analysis showed that a well-implemented sustainable cooling strategy can lead to multiple indirect benefits for the economy and society including improved supply chains, new jobs, better health and increased livelihoods.

The analysis identifies eight key clustered opportunities where concessional finance can play a significant role in advancing the goals of ICAP and sustainable cooling in India. The study presents actionable roadmaps for four cooling sectors and includes prioritized opportunities for concessional financing and private sector investments. The roadmaps also identify key policy actions that are required to jumpstart action in each of the associated sectors. The analysis also recognizes the key stakeholders required for planning and implementation.

Key recommendations

Over the next two decades, India will experience significant growth in residential and commercial floor space. Policies and investments must prioritize climate-responsive construction to avoid long-term lock-in of inefficient building stock.

In India, 45 percent of the country’s peak electricity demand in 2050 is expected to come from space cooling alone. The study estimates that the market potential and investment opportunity in space cooling will be US$1.5 trillion by 2040.

Sustainable cooling can also support India’s development and help in a green COVID-19 recovery by creating jobs and boosting the economy. The study estimates that provision of thermal comfort through sustainable space cooling offers an emissions reduction potential of over 200 million tons of carbon dioxide equivalent (mtCO2e) annually by 2040. Of this the emission reduction potential accruing from the provision of sustainable cooling solutions to the residential sector is over 80 mtCO2e.

As noted earlier, this study identifies four key concessional finance opportunities across the space cooling sector that have strong technical feasibility and can result in high climate and development benefits. These include:

• Mainstreaming thermal comfort parameters in affordable housing policies and programs at the national and state levels.
• Mainstreaming passive cooling measures in urban planning.
• Enabling market transformation towards super efficiency for high energy impact cooling technologies.
• Supporting the uptake of tri-generation and District Cooling Systems (DCS).

The full report can be accessed here