Experts drawn from different sectors of industry have called for a comprehensive, collaborative and holistic approach to address the challenge of driving energy efficiency and sustainability.

At the three-day CII Conference on Energy Efficiency, Meher Padumjee, Chairperson, Energy Efficiency Summit, 2019, said the Indian economy has grown from half a trillion dollar 20 years ago to a near $3 trillion one with the energy demand growing by five times and energy efficiency measures resulting in savings of about 6 per cent.

“This is no mean achievement but a lot has to be done as we set out to achieving our long-term goals of sustainability and meeting 2030 SDGs,” she said. India imports nearly 83 per cent of its oil requirement and there is an ever increasing demand for oil. But this has to change as we work towards addressing climate change, she said.. Ravichandran Purushothaman, President, Danfoss Industries, said Internet of things, big data and digitalisation have immense scope to play a role in addressing the issues relating to energy efficiency. IoT, machine learning and bloc chain technologies could be integrated into the energy efficiency platform and empower people in decision making, he said.

Expressing concerns about MSMEs not participating in energy efficiency initiatives due to various factors, including lack of finance, Pankaj Sindhwani of Tata Cleantech Capital, said the Energy Service Company (ESCO) model could be one way of addressing their needs.

“Even in larger corporates, the discussion on energy efficiency is still stuck at the Boardroom level. There is a need for change in mindset,” Sindhwani said.

KN Rao, Director of Energy and Environment at ACC, said “The cement sector is a shining example of how it took to energy efficiency. It had no option but to take to energy efficiency initiatives as the demand over the past 30 years has always been low versus overall supplies. And since it had to bring down costs and could not pass it on to customers, it quickly adopted energy efficiency measures and today Indian plants have become world class.”

“The energy efficiency measures have now covered practically every aspect of cement factories and now we need to look at more ESCOs playing a role in energy efficiency measures,” Rao said.

Rene Van Berkel of UNIDO Regional Office, said there was a need to integrate renewable and other sources of energy into energy efficiency and look at this a single unit linking up to overall manufacturing excellence.

During interaction, experts at the summit felt that energy efficiency should be viewed holistically and not addressed in silos. Both Centre and States should work collaboratively. They also expressed the need to integrate work of various ministries.

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