India is poised to focus on energy-efficient and high-performance buildings of the future, says the premier guidebook, authored by researchers at the Lawrence Berkeley National Lab (Berkeley Lab) and funded by the U.S. Department of Energy. BIG is a result of historic partnerships and a MoU signed between U.S. and India, focused on developing energy efficiency in buildings in both the countries.
BIG was introduced at the workshop on Clean Energy: Data Centres and Green Building orgnized by the US Trade and Development Agency as part of the US-India Standards and Conformance Cooperation Project (SCCP) Phase II. India is poised to become the world’s fifth largest economy, with the building sector representing over 30% of the nation’s energy consumption. Energy conservation is an important part of India’s overall energy plan and can contribute significantly to the nation’s ability to sustain its growth.
Reshma Singh, lead author of BIG, has studied architecture in India and from Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design. She said: “India is at an inflection point. Because of the extraordinary pace of new constructions, the building sector is recognized as a crucial area to create energy-efficiency and enhance sustainability. BIG draws on years of U.S. buildings R&D, computer simulations, and on-the-ground research in India, to present best practices, strategies and innovative technologies with traditional wisdom.”
Insights from BIG are being shared across the nation through a series of BIGathon events in five host cities: Hyderabad, Mumbai, Delhi, Trivandrum, and Bengaluru. BIGathon events are being held in collaboration with Facilio, a unified SaaS facilities management firm, JLL, US Trade and Development Agency, American National Standards Institute, CII, U.S.- India Business Council, Mahindra, U.S.- India Strategic Partnership Forum, the Energy Management Centre, Nitte School of Architecture, and the World Resources Institute.
“I believe that BIGathon is a change-maker that brings together stakeholders and policy makers from India and U.S. to create a combined perspective for energy-efficient and high-performance buildings of the future,” commented Prabhu Ramachandran, CEO and Co-Founder, Facilio.
The collaboration seeks to take the BIG research into the hands of five primary stakeholders in the built infrastructure arena: urban policy makers; developers and builders; building operators and occupants; architecture and engineering practitioners; and building products and materials industry. The aim is to align a common sustainability framework in the areas of building materials and IoT, smart grid, energy technologies, renewables, and battery storage to enable aggressive energy targets. When integrated, they will provide a tremendous opportunity for strategic, sustainable urbanization and urban health.
