Energy symbiosis for decarbonising India’s hard-to-abate sectors

At the recently concluded 27th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP27), India submitted its long-term strategy to achieve zero emissions by 2070. A key feature of this strategy relates to increasing energy efficiency of industries and exploring decarbonisation options for hard-to-abate sectors, which draw roughly 50% of India’s natural gas, 25% of coal, and 20% of oil resources. Transitioning to net zero for these sectors is not straightforward, owing to extremely high process-temperature requirements, limited decarbonisation options, and the associated huge capital costs.