Gurgaon gone berserk

When it comes to new buildings Gurgaon, the pride of India Inc., has gone berserk. Berserk, in itself is not a bad thing, but berserk using proven to be unsound, financially, ecologically and carbon creating technologies, that even the developed world is eyeing askance is just plain "herd mentality". In my 8th floor high-rise flat, uninterrupted power is guaranteed. Actually its not uninterrupted- it comes back within a few seconds every time it goes off- ten times a day. How? At exorbitant cost from diesel fuelled generators. Gurgaon where basics like water, sewage, roads get scarcer every year, is sprouting malls and high-rises at a blistering pace. So when I walked into the spanking new T3 terminal at New Delhi airport, my heart did a tailspin. On the one hand it is nice to land in world class looking airport. On the other I wondered how they did it? Is it following my Gurgaon flat model?
The Director of Center for Science and Environment, Ms. Sunita Narain writing on the new T3 Terminal at New Delhi, in Times of India [19.11.2010] writes that the airport symbolises what we are doing wrong. I hope every architect, builder and bank in India reads this article. India must "think sustainable" for its own benefit. Eco-friendly is not just about using CFL lights or more efficient air-conditioners. First, it is about design to consume less to begin with. Second it is about using renewable energy. Technology exists for both and even if at this time the technology is expensive its pay-back for India, where energy costs are highest in the world, is attractive.
Besides the exorbitant cost of running the building (it has its own power station), the building is poorly designed for eco-promoting features like parking for public buses. "It is time we found new temples of modern India, which we can be proud of. Not another shopping mall which we want to pass off as an airport" she closes. I agree. Lets do the math. Lets think for ourselves.

VayuGrid Attracts Investor

VayuGrid (wind-energy) has wings! from Gerad Rego:
"I am glad to announce that VayuGrid, a company I co-founded based on a for-profit social business model that just received funding of $4.3m from a strategic investor. Also enclosing a press release of an interview with the President of Mahindra & Mahindra for your perusal. Look forward to collaborating together around the EIR program to replicate a model across industries and across the pyramid. Look forward to collaborating together with other Fellows to see how we can leverage any other work into our business."

Congratulations to Gerard Rego, fellow Digital Vision graduate, on a major milestone: For a report- Check CNBC coverage : M&M eyes majority stake in Vayugrid's Indian ops.

Journey Across India in Electric Car

"... the world needs crazy ideas to change things, because the conventional way of thinking is not working anymore" says Fullbright Scholar Alexis Ringwald, in a New York Times Op-Ed by Thomas Friedman. What is this crazy idea? A Climate Solutions road tour, using modified electric cars from India’s Reva Electric Car Company, whose C.E.O. Ringwald knew. He was persuaded into donating three of his cars and to retrofit them with longer-life batteries that could travel 90 miles on a single six-hour charge — and to lay on a solar roof that would extend them farther. "Between Jan. 1 and Feb. 5, they drove the cars on a 2,100-mile trip from Chennai to New Delhi, stopping in 15 cities and dozens of villages, training Indian students to start their own climate action programs and filming 20 videos of India’s top home-grown energy innovations". Their idea was to bring awareness and spur innovation around energy solutions that are here and now - technology that already exists and can be deployed today. India Climate Solutions website documents the experience and its leadership action wing, The Indian Youth Climate Network aims to generate awareness and empower a generation of young people to take effective action against climate change, at a local, state, national and international level. India with its growing energy needs can emerge not only as the new big green market, but also lead innovation. I have blogged about the Reva car in the past and wondered why we don't see more of them in India - my nephew, who lives in Bangalore, is a 2-Reva Car family and loves them - it is easy to drive in India's narrow roads and distances are manageable. Hopefully this experiment will do something for Reva cars as well.

...And The Winner is .....

Our casestudy competition came to an end Sunday with the winner being SKG - India - Biomass & Biogas -Mothers and daughters making income from selling fertilizer and making electricity.

Many who voted cited this case's ability to also address local sustainable agriculture- which given the recent global food shortages is becoming critically important.With our first event over and our group reaching the facebook imposed cut off limit of 1200 members we will be launching some new initiatives from the facebook fan page:http://www.facebook.com/pages/Bordeaux-Energy-Colloquium/8141228466 Two new initiatives we will start:
ANGEL INVESTING: Competition for groups looking for start-up funding for sustainable energy technologies
ACADEMIC GRANTS: Student research grants for projects studying sustainablity.Hope we can continue to build and reinforce this sustainable community we have created.

New Technology for Energy Savings - Why Bangalore?

New technology innovation and adoption can sometimes happen faster in a developing economy - it has the economic support for investment in new infrastructure because current infrastructure is poor and/or expensive.

This topic came up a few weeks back, at a seminar I gave at Stanford about the economics of innovation. The example I used to make the point is for a technology I am intimately familiar with - the HPLabs "Smart" Data Center. It is a data center cooling technology that can cut down energy use by 40-50%. You would think HP would be debut this technology in an expensive place like Palo Alto, Right?- but no- HP has released it first in Bangalore, India - Why?

Because in Bangalore, just like in other big cities in India, with its poor infrastructure and intermittent power supply, you get data center up time of 24/7 by supplementing grid electricity with diesel burning generators - which is expensive - more so than grid electricity in PA. And so economically it makes more sense to refine/test it there. Additional benefits of course are emissions reduction etc.

So the lesson is - if you have great technology, and it does not seem economically feasible to innovate further in a developed economy, with its good, cheap, reliable infrastructure, try it in an emerging economy - there will be economic as well as environmental incentives, i.e. a double bottom line. For details -check out the Businessweek article.

Energy from Tidal Waves: Gavin Newsom

San Francisco, California, Mayor Gavin Newsom has done it again - being controversial that is - his tidal energy project has lately been debated (or attacked) even by alternative energy supporters.

A while back (early 2006) Newsom announced that the City will explore the possibility of generating power from the tidal flow under the Golden Gate Bridge and launched a $150,000 feasibility study to examine the tidal energy project, which could generate up to 35 megawatts of power, according to the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) and the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission.

The issue is that early indicators point to less promising results and so of course many want to scrap the project.

To which Mr Newsom said something like - I heard this on NPR while driving so I paraphrase- "I understand the the arguments against it. I only want to hear the arguments for it because - somebody's gotta do it - and I'm gonna do it."

This is why you've gotta love Newsom - its not his looks or his gravel voice - its his convictions. And his long term thinking. Research is risky business but its rewards are proportionally great. To give up on a project at the first sign of an obstacle is short term thinking - and in the scheme of things - the investment in this project is modest. He has a goal of making SFO carbon neutral by 2020 (see video on second life) and I think it is a worthy goal. We should be leaders in this space not laggards.

I get his philosophy. At a speech Newsom gave to the Indian American community - he articulated why he loves San Francisco - he said the secret sauce that defines San Francisco is that it is a diverse city (39% born outside the US) where "Dreamers become doers".

So Mr. Treehugger analyst, I disagree with your advice to the Mayor - I do not agree that it is inappropriate use of money to invest in cutting edge research. I agree with Newsom -if we don't do it who will?