Dr. Hariharan Chandrashekar is an Indian ecological economist, founding and presiding over urban people-led movements for urban sustainability on water and energy. a mentor for green enterprise and entrepreneurs, and enabler of industry directions on sustainability and resilience, at the building scale and the city scale.
His current preoccupation has been with the pioneering citizen action initiative, WOW Action Forum[1] and the multi-city WOW Partner City Network that spans cities across South Asia, Africa and the Americas to help citizens and bulk water-users adopt local solutions for water efficiency. The WOW Mission also extends to encouraging and driving public demonstration activity for inspiring water and energy conservation among lay Water-users. WOW is a citizen-led action for demand-side water management[2] with voluntary compliance and solutioning sustainable options for saving water, money, energy and carbon.
He mentors green leadership Programmes for Indian industry and academia under the umbrella of SAANSS[3] and Foundation Green. He is also driving a series of Sustainability Peer Reviews[4] for projects that aspire to go deep green with Net Zero Water and Energy[5] guidelines
Career
Over three decades he has led many enterprise initiatives to promote and mainstream sustainability businesses with green and resilient homes under the banner of ZED Homes that he founded and nurtured for over 22 years. In recent years at the AltTech Foundation[6] the mission is clearly to accelerate sustainability directions across the board in industry, residential and commercial sectors of urban India.
Hariharan is the founder of Biodiversity Conservation India Limited,[7] a builder of environmentally friendly homes, and of AltTech Foundation, which focuses on zero energy development and low-Carbon development and Deep Decarbonisation strategies for buildings.
Between 1991 and 2015, he helped launch and nurture three national environment-related Trusts, and six companies working in green residential buildings and the production of green products.
In 1991, he founded the Academy for Mountain Environics [now the Environics Trust].[10] This organization works on traditional rights of people Impacted by excessive natural exploitation. In 1994, he founded Biodiversity Conservation India Limited and stepped down in 2017 to make way for new leadership. The company creates homes with deep Eco-directions for materials, and use/reuse of water, energy, and waste. In 2004, Hariharan established the AltTech Foundation (ATF),[6] a not-for-profit organization working on energy and water solutions. Since 2018, the Foundation has worked on retrofitting a few chosen existing buildings in India to heighten Energy Efficiency.
Between 2012 and 2013, Hariharan served as technical advisor for the Karnataka Urban Water Supply & Sewerage Board.[11] He also worked as a sustainability advisor for Bengaluru Central University in Bangalore.
He has been an itinerant resource leader for the World Resources Institute, Les Ateliers Maitrise d’Oeuvres Urbaine, ADEME, and UN Habitat.
He has consulted for the governments of Uttaranchal, Kerala and Nagaland on eco-tourism infrastructure and environment policies. He has also served as consultant for urban water supply and sanitation development as well as on practices for promoting energy efficiency in buildings and in cities, for a number of Indian and global development organizations.
He writes occasionally in national dailies and e-media on how consumers can go green at minimal cost.
Memberships and advisory
Founder member and Senior Fellow of the CII India Green Business Council national executive committee.
Partner for the Canada India Center Carleton Univ at Ottawa.
Lead resource person for the Centre of Excellence for Sustainable Futures of the Govt of Karnataka
Editorial Advisory member, Society for Energy Engineers and Managers.
Water conservation includes all the policies, strategies and activities to sustainably manage the natural resource of fresh water, to protect the hydrosphere, and to meet the current and future human demand. Population, household size and growth and affluence all affect how much water is used. Factors such as climate change have increased pressures on natural water resources especially in manufacturing and agricultural irrigation. Many countries have already implemented policies aimed at water conservation, with much success. The key activities to conserve water are as follows: any beneficial reduction in water loss, use and waste of resources, avoiding any damage to water quality; and improving water management practices that reduce the use or enhance the beneficial use of water. Technology solutions exist for households, commercial and agricultural applications. Water conservation programs involved in social solutions are typically initiated at the local level, by either municipal water utilities or regional governments. Common strategies include public outreach campaigns, tiered water rates, or restrictions on outdoor water use such as lawn watering and car washing.
Energy conservation is the effort made to reduce the consumption of energy by using less of an energy service. This can be achieved either by using energy more efficiently or by reducing the amount of service used. Energy conservation is a part of the concept of Eco-sufficiency. Energy conservation measures (ECMs) in buildings reduce the need for energy services and can result in increased environmental quality, national security, personal financial security and higher savings. It is at the top of the sustainable energy hierarchy. It also lowers energy costs by preventing future resource depletion.
Green building refers to both a structure and the application of processes that are environmentally responsible and resource-efficient throughout a building's life-cycle: from planning to design, construction, operation, maintenance, renovation, and demolition. This requires close cooperation of the contractor, the architects, the engineers, and the client at all project stages. The Green Building practice expands and complements the classical building design concerns of economy, utility, durability, and comfort. In doing so, the three dimensions of sustainability, i.e., planet, people and profit across the entire supply chain need to be considered.
Sustainable architecture is architecture that seeks to minimize the negative environmental impact of buildings by efficiency and moderation in the use of materials, energy, development space and the ecosystem at large. Sustainable architecture uses a conscious approach to energy and ecological conservation in the design of the built environment.
A Zero Energy Building (ZEB), also known as a Net Zero Energy (NZE) building, or a Zero Net Energy (ZNE) building, is a building with net zero energy consumption, meaning the total amount of energy used by the building on an annual basis is equal to the amount of renewable energy created on the site or in other definitions by renewable energy sources offsite, using technology such as heat pumps, high efficiency windows and insulation, and solar panels. The goal is that these buildings contribute less overall greenhouse gas to the atmosphere during operations than similar non-ZNE buildings. They do at times consume non-renewable energy and produce greenhouse gases, but at other times reduce energy consumption and greenhouse gas production elsewhere by the same amount. Zero-energy buildings are not only driven by a want to have less of an impact on the environment, but they are also driven by money. Tax breaks as well as savings on energy costs make Zero-energy buildings financially viable. A similar concept approved and implemented by the European Union and other agreeing countries is nearly Zero Energy Building (nZEB), with the goal of having all buildings in the region under nZEB standards by 2020. Terminology tends to vary between countries, agencies, cities, towns and reports, so a general knowledge of this concept and its various employments is essential for a versatile understanding of clean energy and renewables. The IEA and European Union most commonly use Net Zero Energy, with "zero net" mainly used in the USA.
Renewable heat is an application of renewable energy referring to the generation of heat from renewable sources; for example, feeding radiators with water warmed by focused solar radiation rather than by a fossil fuel boiler. Renewable heat technologies include renewable biofuels, solar heating, geothermal heating, heat pumps and heat exchangers. Insulation is almost always an important factor in how renewable heating is implemented.
The Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) is a non-governmental trade association and advocacy group headquartered in New Delhi, India, founded in 1895.
Domestic housing in the United Kingdom presents a possible opportunity for achieving the 20% overall cut in UK carbon dioxide emissions targeted by the Government for 2010. However, the process of achieving that drop is proving problematic given the very wide range of age and condition of the UK housing stock.
The sustainable city, eco-city, or green city is a city designed with consideration for social, economic, environmental impact, and resilient habitat for existing populations, without compromising the ability of future generations to experience the same. The UN Sustainable Development Goal 11 defines sustainable cities as those that are dedicated to achieving green sustainability, social sustainability and economic sustainability. They are committed to doing so by enabling opportunities for all through a design focused on inclusivity as well as maintaining a sustainable economic growth. The focus also includes minimizing required inputs of energy, water, and food, and drastically reducing waste, output of heat, air pollution – CO 2, methane, and water pollution. Richard Register first coined the term ecocity in his 1987 book Ecocity Berkeley: Building Cities for a Healthy Future, where he offers innovative city planning solutions that would work anywhere. Other leading figures who envisioned sustainable cities are architect Paul F Downton, who later founded the company Ecopolis Pty Ltd, as well as authors Timothy Beatley and Steffen Lehmann, who have written extensively on the subject. The field of industrial ecology is sometimes used in planning these cities.
Energy Saving Trust (EST) is a British organization devoted to promoting energy efficiency, energy conservation, and the sustainable use of energy, thereby reducing carbon dioxide emissions and helping to prevent man-made climate change. It was founded in the United Kingdom as a government-sponsored initiative in 1992, following the global Earth Summit.
Green infrastructure or blue-green infrastructure refers to a network that provides the “ingredients” for solving urban and climatic challenges by building with nature. The main components of this approach include stormwater management, climate adaptation, the reduction of heat stress, increasing biodiversity, food production, better air quality, sustainable energy production, clean water, and healthy soils, as well as more anthropocentric functions, such as increased quality of life through recreation and the provision of shade and shelter in and around towns and cities. Green infrastructure also serves to provide an ecological framework for social, economic, and environmental health of the surroundings.
The National Energy Foundation (NEF) is an independent British charity, established to improve the use of energy in buildings.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to sustainability:
The natural environment, commonly referred to simply as the environment, includes all living and non-living things occurring naturally on Earth.
The Green Movement in India is an emerging movement that stresses environmentally friendly practices and initiatives in transport, construction, law and more.
A green building is one which uses less water, optimises energy efficiency, conserves natural resources, generates less waste and provides healthier spaces for occupants, as compared to a conventional building. The Indian green building council (IGBC) is the leading green building movement in the country.
Environmentally sustainable design is the philosophy of designing physical objects, the built environment, and services to comply with the principles of ecological sustainability.
Nonresidential water use refers to all uses of publicly-supplied (municipal) water other than residential use. The nonresidential users include industrial (I), commercial (C), and institutional (I) sub-sectors, which are often jointly designated as ICI or CII sector.
National Action Plan for Climate Change (NAPCC) is a Government of India's programme launched in 2008 to mitigate and adapt to the adverse impact of climate change. The action plan was launched in 2008 with 8 sub-missions. The plan aims at fulfilling India's developmental objectives with focus on reducing emission intensity of its economy. The plan will rely on the support from the developed countries with the prime focus of keeping its carbon emissions below the developed economies at any point of time. The 8 missions under NAPCC are as follows:
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