With municipal offices and hospitals accounting for the highest electricity consumption, the Net Zero Action Plan for Mumbai has proposed pilot projects for implementation of energy efficiency measures in R/Central ward office and Nair hospital. (Express photo)
Mumbai’s municipal schools, offices, hospitals and auditoriums account for 14.7 percent of the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation’s (BMC) total electricity consumption, the study ‘Net Zero Action Plan for Municipal Buildings of Mumbai and Panvel’ has found.
Prepared by C40, the ‘Net Zero Action Plan’ has laid out a roadmap to transition all existing civic buildings to net-zero energy and all new municipal buildings to ‘net-zero carbon’ by 2050. With the objective of eventually replicating the model across all civic buildings, the study has proposed pilot projects in Mumbai’s Nair hospital and R/Central ward office.
Announced by the state government during the Mumbai Climate Week, the action plan seeks to implement technical, financial and governance interventions to reduce emissions across existing and new municipal buildings by 2050.
Currently, the C40 assessment projects that municipal buildings under BMC jurisdiction account for 19 % of the total municipal electricity consumption. Of this, municipal hospitals account for 9.8 % of the total consumption, followed by 3.8 % consumption by municipal offices, 1.2 % by schools and 1 % by auditoriums.
Eyeing to prepare energy conservation measures to achieve the net-zero and net-carbon targets, the study launched energy audit walkthroughs across municipal schools, offices, hospitals and auditoriums including three municipal school buildings – LK Waghji Mumbai Public School, Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Nag. School No1 and Sodawala Municipal School, followed by two municipal hospitals – KEM and Nair, two ward offices – R/Central and H/West wards and two municipal auditoriums – Kalidas Natyagriha and Prabodhankar Natyagriha.
Following the study, it identified that new municipal buildings offer a key opportunity to achieve net-zero carbon status through use of low-carbon construction materials. The report lays out a five-pronged approach for new municipal buildings through passive design measures, active design interventions, low-carbon material selection, integration of renewable energy, and clean energy procurement.
Identifying the budgetary constraints within the BMC set-up, for the existing municipal buildings meanwhile, the report has called for low-cost energy conservation interventions such as replacing lighting with LEDs, replacement of conventional fans to BLDC fans which use 30-40 percent less energy, replacing outdated air conditioners and utilisation of green cess revenues.
The plan has also called for a phased replacement approach through replacement of 6-10 year old fans in the first phase, followed by replacement of fans less than 5 years old in the subsequent phase.
The report has pointed for implementation of low-cost intervention through its BMC’s climate budget. At present, the report suggests that while 32.18 percent of BMC’s total capital budget is routed towards climate-relevant activities, only 0.1 percent of it (or 32.5 crore) is earmarked for rooftop solar installations or LED retrofits.
While the plan seeks to completely convert existing municipal buildings to ‘net-zero energy’ and new buildings to ‘net-zero carbon’ by 2050, it seeks to achieve the goals through phased targets with completion of baseline audits and implementation of low-cost measures by 2030, followed by completion of 50 % of net-zero energy plans through rooftop solars and efficiency measures by 2040.
Pilot projects in BMC office, Nair hospital
For the two civic buildings, the plan proposes behavioral changes through change in temperatures, replacement of old fans, AC replacement as well as solar rooftop installations. While Nair hospital is proposed to have an overall payback period of 2.5 – 5 years, the R/Central ward office is estimated to have a maximum payback period of 6-10 years for its centralised AC plan.
Curated by James Chen
