Greener cooling technologies can open $1.6 trillion investment opportunity in India

The report, “Climate Investment Opportunities in India’s Cooling Sector” finds that shifting to a more energy efficient pathway could lead to a substantial reduction in expected CO2 levels over the next two decades.

A new World Bank report finds that as temperatures steadily rise in India due to climate change, keeping spaces cool using alternative and innovative energy efficient technologies can open an investment opportunity of $1.6 trillion by 2040.  This also has the potential to reduce greenhouse gas emissions significantly and create nearly 3.7 million jobs.

India is experiencing higher temperatures every year. By 2030, over 160-200 million people across the country could be exposed to lethal heat waves annually. Around 34 million people in India will face job losses due to heat stress related productivity decline.  The current food loss due to heat during transportation is close to $13 billion annually.  By 2037, the demand for cooling is likely to be eight times more than current levels. This means there will be a demand for a new air-conditioner every 15 seconds, leading to an expected rise of 435 percent in annual greenhouse gas emissions over the next two decades.

The report, “Climate Investment Opportunities in India’s Cooling Sector” finds that shifting to a more energy efficient pathway could lead to a substantial reduction in expected CO2 levels over the next two decades.

“India’s cooling strategy can help save lives and livelihoods, reduce carbon emissions, and simultaneously position India as a global hub for green cooling manufacturing,” said Auguste Tano Kouamé, the World Bank’s Country Director in India. “The report suggests a sustainable roadmap for cooling that has the potential to reduce 300 million tons of carbon dioxide annually by 2040.”

Recognizing this challenge, India is already deploying new strategies to help people adapt to rising temperatures. In 2019, it launched the India Cooling Action Plan (ICAP) to provide sustainable cooling measures across various sectors, including indoor cooling in buildings and cold chain and refrigeration in the agriculture and pharmaceuticals sector, and air-conditioning in passenger transport.  Its aim is to reduce the demand for cooling by up to 25 percent by 2037-38.

The new World Bank report proposes a roadmap to support the ICAP’s new investments in three major sectors: building construction, cold chains, and refrigerants.

Adopting climate-responsive cooling techniques as a norm in both private and government-funded constructions can ensure that those at the bottom of the economic ladder are not disproportionately affected by rising temperatures. The report suggests that India’s affordable housing program for the poor, the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (PMAY), can adopt such changes on scale. This could benefit over 11 million urban homes and over 29 million rural houses that the government aims to construct.

The report also recommends private investments in district cooling technologies. These generate chilled water in a central plant which is then distributed to multiple buildings via underground insulated pipes. This brings down the cost for providing cooling to individual buildings and can reduce energy bills by 20-30 percent compared to the most efficient conventional cooling solution.

To minimize rising food and pharmaceutical wastage during transport due to higher temperatures, the report recommends fixing gaps in cold chain distribution networks. Investing in pre-cooling and refrigerated transport can help decrease food loss by about 76 percent and reduce carbon emissions by 16 percent.

India aims to phase out the production and use of ozone-depleting hydrochlorofluorocarbons, used as coolants in air conditioners and refrigerators by 2047. The report recommends improvements in servicing, maintenance and disposal of equipment that use hydrochlorofluorocarbons, alongside a shift to alternative options with a lower global warming footprint. This can create 2 million jobs for trained technicians over the next two decades and reduce the demand for refrigerants by around 31 percent.

“The right set of policy actions and public investments can help leverage large scale private investment in this sector. We recommend that these moves be accelerated by creating a flagship government mission to address the challenges and opportunities from rising temperatures in India,” say the authors of the report, Abhas K. Jha, Practice Manager, Climate and Disaster Risk Management, South Asia and Mehul Jain, Climate Change Specialist, World Bank.