PROMOTING

CLEAN AND
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COLD-CHAIN IN
INDIA
PROMOTING
CLEAN AND
ENERGY
EFFICIENT
COLD-CHAIN IN
INDIA

APRIL - 2019
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CLEAN AND ENERGY EFFICIENT COLD-CHAIN IN INDIA: EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
The project team acknowledges inputs provided by several individuals from different
stakeholder groups. Particularly, we acknowledge inputs from Mr. Jagmohan Singh, Optimal
Agro Producer Company Ltd., Ambala, Haryana; Mr. Satbir Singh, Crown Fruits and Vegetables
Producer Company Ltd., Kurukshetra, Haryana representing Farmers’ Producers’ Organizations
in Haryana and Mr. Vilas Shinde of Sahydri Farms in Maharashtra. We acknowledge inputs
from private sector fruits and vegetables value-chain providers that included Mr. Binwant
Nain, AHA LLB, Shahbad, Haryana; Ms. Seema Gulati, Elle Farms/ Mushrooms, Karnal, Haryana,
Saravjeet Singh, FreshproAgri Solutions Pvt. Ltd., Kurukshetra, Haryana; Mr. V.P. Patil and
Dr. Homaji Bhangale, Jain Farm Fresh, Jalgaon, Maharashtra. Above-mentioned individuals
contributed to the case studies documented in this report. This report benefitted a lot from
the insights provided by Mr. Pawanexh Kohli - CEO and Chief Advisor, National Cold-chain
Development (NCCD) whose thought-leadership has been useful to our team’s exploration. We
also thank Mr. Gyanesh Bharati- Jt. Secretary (Ex), Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate
Change (MOEF&CC) and Mr. Ajay Bakre, Director General at the Bureau of Energy Efficiency.
We also thank Government of Haryana officials – most notably Mr. T. L. Satyaprakash, I. A.
S., Managing Director, Haryana State Industrial and Infrastructure Corporation (HSIIDC); Ms.
Deepika Handa, Assistant General Manager, HSIIDC; Dr. Hardeep Singh, Chief Administrator,
Haryana State Agriculture and Marketing Board; Dr. Arjun Saini, Director General, Horticulture
Department; Dr. Ranbir Singh, Jt. Director, Horticulture Department; Mr. Yoginder Singh, State
Consultant, Small Farmers Agribusiness Consortium Haryana (SFACH). Inputs and support
provided by Mr. Dipankar Chakravarti of the UK Trade Initiative was timely and useful in
reaching out to several stakeholders in the state of Haryana and Punjab. During the course of
the project, we interacted with several technology providers who shared important insights
related to the cold-chain technology innovations. This report is a result of collaborative effort
between the University of Birmingham led by Prof. Toby Peters who has been a backbone to
the propositions made by our team: Shakti Sustainable Energy Foundation and MP Ensystems’.

PROJECT TEAM
Shakti Sustainable Energy Foundation: Mr. Shubhashis Dey and Ms. Chetna Nagpal
University of Birmingham: Prof. Toby Peters
MP Ensystems Advisory Pvt. Ltd.: Dr. Mahesh Patankar, Dr. Roshni Udyavar Yehuda,
Mr. Chinmay Chattbar, Mr. Shirish Deshpande, Ms. Ira Prem and Ms. Smitha Lobo
Partner organizations: NABCONS: Mr. Samrat Mukherjee and Mr. AmareshDey
ACR Project Consultants Pvt. Ltd.: Mr. Arvind Surange, Ms. Aditi Surange, and
Mr. Harshal Surange
Editor: Abigail Page
External review: Dr Tim Fox
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FOREWORD BY
Toby Peters and Pawanexh Kohli
Professor Pawanexh Kohli, CEO & Advisor, National Centre for Cold-chain Development and
Visiting Professor, Post-harvest logistics, University of Birmingham, Prof Toby Peters, Professor
in Cold Economy, University of Birmingham

T
oday compared with the start of the 1960s, India now harvests 40 times as much tomato;
14 times more potato; 8 times more wheat; three times as much in poultry and meat, 13
times more fish; 8 times more milk, and almost 40 times more eggs. India’s food production
has massively outpaced population growth which grew 2.8 times from 461 million in 1961.

In India, despite sufficient and surplus production, under-nutrition prevails and hunger is
not eradicated. An underlying problem is that historically we have correlated population (or
demand), with food production (or supply). But production alone is not sufficient to ensure
supply of food - the missing condition is physical and effective market connectivity. As we
strive to produce more food, if the logistics mechanism is unable to cope with the flood of farm
produce, the production does not equal supply, and the losses that result will wipe out much
of the benefits.

Ineffective delivery systems also limit the producers’ valuation to near-farm demand. Cold-
chain is essential to connect a farmer to new urban markets further afield for increased volume
demand and higher prices. But whether produce has a holding life of a week or forty weeks, the
inventory must reach consumers in time, and in the right quality.

Cold stores are only one piece of the cold-chain. Storage by itself is not a solution. Cold-chain
is not about preservation, it applies technology to stretch the marketable time of a perishable
product, for a finite duration. In short, cold-chain buys time, to temporarily extend the saleable
life. The time in hand should be fruitfully utilised to expand market reach, especially for highly
perishable fresh produce.

Cold-chain is an integrated, seamless and resilient network of refrigerated and temperature

controlled pack houses, distribution hubs, vehicles and processes to maintain the safety, quality
and quantity of food, while moving it swiftly from farm gate to consumption centre. These need
to be suitably indigenised and ideally made in country. Cold-chains enhance economic wealth,
cash flow and security for farmers and improve food quality, safety and value to the customer;
and must achieve this with minimum environmental impact.

However, here is the conundrum. While food lost in the delivery chain is avoidable through
use of technology, cold-chain itself is an energy intensive application, often relying on diesel
for off-grid and on-vehicle cooling. Any indiscriminate use of technology can lead to undesired
hazards. Future development must harness the portfolio of renewable energy resources, new
thermally-focused energy systems, innovative thermal management; not merely focus on
optimising its existing fuel or electricity consumption.
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How to use the integrated components of storage and transport for cross-geography access or
distance-price arbitrage, time-arbitrage or even cross-seasonal trading becomes as important
as the physical infrastructure to flow of food from farm to fork. Within this, the infrastructure
is only half the solution. Equally important is, the flow of key information from wholesaler,
retailer or consumer to producer – from fork to farm - which can help shape time of planting
and harvest as well as choice of produce to grow. This will drive resource conscious robust
business models and viable financing models to underpin the investment in clean cold-chain.

But whereas the cold-chain will morph over time, driven by market demand, the motivation
for specific interventions should not simply be to accelerate deployment, but also address
the challenge outlined above: the need to deliver market connectivity in an environmentally
sustainable way. We welcome the opportunity to be associated and involved in this study by
Shakti Foundation to explore how India can build out clean cold-chains.
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PREFACE BY
Krishan Dhawan
CEO, Shakti Sustainable Energy Foundation

T
he Government of India (GoI) has placed substantial emphasis on increasing farmers’
income by 2022 through productivity gains. In 2016, the GoI launched ‘Operation
Green’ to support agri-logistics, food processing units and food producer organizations.
Developing “cold chains” is one of the key measures under “Operation Green” to arrest food loss
from the farm gate to consumers.

Cold-chains are expected to proliferate rapidly in India during the next few years through a
combination of market and policy driven efforts. According to India’s Cooling Action Plan,
under a business-as-usual scenario, the energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions
from cold-chains is likely to increase manifold by 2037.

But unplanned investments in the cold-chain sector can create a carbon intensive stand-alone
infrastructure of cold storages, reefer vehicles and ripening chambers instead of a sustainable
and cohesive agri-supply chain. As a signatory to the Paris Agreement and the Kigali Agreement,
India will need to reassess the development of its cold-chains in order to reduce GHG emissions
from this sector.

Recognizing this, Shakti in collaboration with key partners is supporting efforts to advance
cleaner and more energy-efficient cold chains in India. A critical way to enable this transition
is to introduce clean technologies, which will help prevent the long-term lock-in of fossil-fuel
intensive technologies. This study, commissioned by Shakti and developed by MP Ensystems
Advisory Pvt. Ltd. with support from the University of Birmingham, assesses existing
technologies, energy consumption, use of renewable energy, and Global Warming Potential
(GWP) of refrigerants that are currently used in India’s cold-chain infrastructure.

Based on the empirical assessments in the state of Haryana, this study makes key
recommendations for the development of clean cold chain in India: Promoting new business
models (viz., IT enabled services for managing harvesting and logistics from fork to farm and
delivering Refrigeration as a Service), developing cold-chain living labs and innovation centres,
creating infrastructure for training and outreach, facilitating hackathons and preparing IT
based agri-supply chain solutions.

I trust that this study will serve as an important reference for policy makers, farmer producer
organizations, private sector and other stakeholders working to deliver cleaner and more
energy-efficient cold chains while assisting India in meeting its ambitious climate goals.

Krishan Dhawan
Chief Executive Officer
Shakti Sustainable Energy Foundation
ABBREVIATIONS
APEDA: Agricultural and Processed Food Products Export Development Authority
APVAC: Atmospheric Pressure Vacuum Drying
ACFW: Agriculture & Farmers Welfare
BAU: Business-As-Usual
BEE: Bureau of Energy Efficiency
CA: Controlled Atmosphere
CFCs: Chlorofluoro carbons
CCDP: Crop Cluster Development Program
CTARA: Center for Technology Alternatives for Rural Areas
CSISAC: Central Sector Integrated Scheme on Agricultural Cooperation
DFI: Doubling Farmer’s Income
FCI: Fixed Capital investment
FPCs: Farmer Producer Companies
FPOs: Farmer producer organizations
GHG: Greenhouse Gases
GWP: Global Warming Potential
GtCO2e: Gigatonnes of Carbon Dioxide Equivalent
HFCs: Hydrofluorocarbons
HFOs: Hydrofluoroolefins
HSAMB: Haryana State Agricultural Marketing Board
HSIIDC: Haryana State Industrial Infrastructure Development Corporation
HWDT: Hot Water Dip Treatment
IOT : Internet of Things
ICAR-CIPHET: Indian Council for Agricultural Research-Central Institute of Post-Harvest
Engineering and Technology
LOI: Letter of Intent
LULUCF: Land Use, Land-Use Change and Forestry
MIDH: Mission for Integrated Development of Horticulture
MOEF CC: Ministry of Environment Forest and Climate Change
NABARD: National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development
NABCONS: NABARD Consultancy
ICAP: India Cooling Action Plan
NCCD: National Centre for Cold-chain Development
NITI Aayog: National Institution for Transforming India
NDC: Nationally Determined Contribution
ODP: Ozone Depleting Potential
ODS: Ozone Depleting Substances
PCM: Phase Change Material
QSRs: Quick Serving Restaurants
REEFER: Refrigerated Transport
SFACH: Small Farmer Agri-Business Consortium, Haryana
STL: System for Low Temperature
SWOT: Strength, Weakness, Opportunity and Threats
UoB: University of Birmingham
VAMs: Vapour Absorption Machines
VCC: Vapor Compression Cycle
VFD: Variable Frequency Drive
VHT: Vapour Heat Treatment
WRI: World Resources Institute
ZECC: Zero Energy Cool Chambers

NOTE:
Currency equivalence considered in the report: 1 US $ = INR 70
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CONTENTS

BACKGROUND AND INTRODUCTION 11

FINDINGS

1. Current failures and barriers to the deployment of cooling technology 13

2. Review of existing pack-houses and cold-storage facilities 15
3. End-to-end cold-chain – assessment of impact on energy and emissions 16
4. Clean cold-chain technologies 17
5. Merit order of clean-cooling interventions 19
6. Recommendations 22
References 29
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BACKGROUND
and Introduction

Context
• Agriculture and allied sub-sectors is a substantive part of the Indian economy, contributing
up to 14.4% of GDP and half (49.8%) of the country’ employment (NITI Aayog, Govt. of India
2015).

• The Indian food and grocery market is the world’s sixth largest (India Brand Equity
Foundation 2018).

• Presently, on average there is a 120% increase between the price Indian farmers typically
receive for their produce and the price at which it is sold to the retailer (Ernst & Young
Pvt Ltd, 2013). According to NCCD, the price wedge between farm-gate sales and terminal
wholesale can be as high as 1000% for perishable produce. This price wedge can be bridged
through cold-chains.
• For some crops, up to 40% of the harvested produce is lost between the farm gate and the
market. This reduces the farmer’s income, his capacity to invest and fails to provide him an
incentive to grow more produce. Also, in a rapidly urbanizing market place, such huge loss
of produce negatively impacts the cost of food and subsequently affects the end consumer.
(Inter-Ministerial Committee for Doubling Farmer’s Income, 2017).
• Future agricultural development requires developing a systems approach, cutting across
pre-production, production and post production. Agriculture, can no longer be perceived
from a narrow traditional vision, as activities relating to cultivation, rearing or harvesting of
crops or animal produce. It is most appropriate to adopt a holistic attitude, one that includes
the delivery mechanism.
• Applications of cold-chain have been proven to enhance the income, economic wealth and
financial security of farmers, growers and fishermen as well as improve the food’s quality,
safety and value.

• Clean cold-chain is delivering cold-chain in a sustainable manner with minimal environmental

and natural resource impact and within the country’s CO2, natural resource and
clean air targets
• A cold-chain is an integrated, seamless and resilient logistics network of refrigerated and
temperature-controlled pack houses, transport modes, cold storages, distribution hubs and
merchandising platforms, that are used to maintain the safety, quality and quantity of food
produce, while moving it from point of harvest to consumption point. Where possible, swift
connectivity with demand results in faster cash flows and reduced risk of inventory. The
non-availability of cold-chain leads to an average of 15-20% loss of food (i.e 50% of the post-
harvest food loss), as well as an imbalance in linking demand with supply that can often
result in large scale discarding of produce during harvest season.
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• A lack of information to farmers and inadequate supply-chain management, as well as the

unavailability of appropriate cold-chain technologies, hinders access to better markets,
which could increase selling prices by as much as 4 – 5 times.

• There are positive examples of how small farmers have used cold-chains plus business
management to create direct market access and significantly increase turnover and profit.

• The Government of India (GoI) has set the target of doubling farmers’ incomes by 2022. It
has identified investment in cold-chain logistics as a vital component of its farm income
strategy (Inter-Ministerial Committee for Doubling Farmer’s Income, 2017) and (NITI Aayog,
Govt. of India 2015), and recently launched its national cooling action plan titled India
Cooling Action Plan (ICAP) on 8-March-2019.

Objectives
The objective of this study was to identify the scope of the business, technical and operational
improvements required to deliver clean cold-chains in India. The work also aimed to develop a
vision for clean cold-chains alongside innovative implementation and financing options.

Methodology
Primary research was conducted in the states of Haryana, Punjab, Maharashtra and Karnataka.
It included:

• Rapid assessment of the existing cold-chain landscape (infrastructure, take-up, status etc.);

• Assessment of existing technologies (including their energy intensity) used to deliver farm
fresh produce to the marketplace;

• Understanding of existing market failures and barriers to deployment of cold chains;

• Understanding of existing local capacity to design and manage cold-chain assets;

• A focus on closed-loop opportunities rather than conventional structures where only one
end-use is addressed.1

Data was gathered via

• Field visits with Farmer Producer Organisations (FPOs), Farmer Producer Companies (FPCs)
and Farmer Cooperatives;

• Workshops with policy makers and representatives from the cooling industry, agriculture
and food industry, and third sector organisations;

• Field visits and interviews to develop case studies of organisations currently using, or
proposing to use, cold-chain technologies and infrastructure;

• Socio, technical and financial analysis of possible clean-cooling solutions, identifying the
economic gains for certain crop clusters in the state of Haryana.

1
By closed-loops we mean considering waste or secondary outputs from one process to be used as an input in
the other processes. In case of thermal processes, this could mean harnessing waste heat or cold from other
applications through heat transfer methods.
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FINDINGS

1. Current failures and barriers

to the deployment of cooling technology
Barriers to the deployment of cooling technologies were identified throughout the perishable
produce food supply chain, from first mile (the flow of produce from the farm-gates to a
local aggregator) to last mile (final haulage of produce from the wholesale markets closer to
the centres of food demand in towns and cities – to retail chains). In addition, a number of
overarching issues that have implications across the cold-chain were noted.

First Mile failures and barriers

There is currently limited availability of infrastructure and technology
“COLD-CHAIN NEEDS suitable for first mile business processes, including:
TO BE CREATED • Limited capacity for storage at farm gates;
THROUGH BOTTOM- • Lack of adequate/ continuous power supply;
UP APPROACH AND • Inadequate knowledge and skills to carry out processes efficiently to
THERE IS HUGE ensure productivity and financial viability.

SCOPE IN IMPROVING Furthermore, for many farmers operating at small-scale, the use of
existing cold-chain facilities incurs high costs.
FIRST AND LAST MILE
Despite some government activity, there is an overall lack of policy
LOGISTICS” support to facilitate first mile processes in the cold-chain; the focus
- Ms. Seema Gulati, remains further along the value chain, closer to last mile processes.
Elle Farms Haryana Even where the government has developed pack-houses, there is often
poor use of these facilities due to:

• Lack of appropriate infrastructure to transport the produce from the

farm-gate to the pack-house. First mile transportation is dependent on farm vehicles such
as tractor trailers, which are inadequate in maintaining freshness of horticultural produce
and lead to losses. Conventional refrigerated reefer vehicles are financially unaffordable for
farmers unless the services are grouped under an FPO or cooperative;

• Limited financial capacity of marginal and small farmers to store the produce at the farm-
gate;
• Higher cost of electricity coupled with lower operational efficiencies;
• Poor operation and maintenance of facilities;
• Lack of understanding of business, specifically farm to fork business models.
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Last Mile failures and barriers

A lack of appropriate infrastructure and utilisation of equipment as well
“TOMATOES THAT
as a failure to take full advantage of the potential of new technologies is
FETCH YOU RS. 20 resulting in barriers in the last mile of cold-chains in India.
PER CRATE IN ONE • Many businesses providing logistical support from warehouses to
SEASON, CAN FETCH retail shops are not organised businesses (businesses that are not
formally registered businesses and use formal logistical network
RS. 200 PER CRATE IN planning), which results in haphazard network management.
OFF-SEASON” • Even with the advent of e-commerce in India, the logistics process
is not fully developed to optimize supply and demand in the food
- Mr. Satbir Singh,
produce value-chain.
Crown Fruits &
Vegetables Company Ltd. • There is low use, if at all, of IT techniques to optimise haulage using
a hub-and-spoke model.
• There is a lack of infrastructure (e.g. right of way to food supply
vehicles) and technology (e.g. low-carbon transportation including
refrigerated small trucks using phase-change materials to retain produce quality), which
prevents appropriate transportation of goods from large warehouses (close to town/city
centres) to retailers.
• The equipment used in the transfer of produce from physical to mobile infrastructure is not
always best suited to handling perishable food produce.
• There is a lack of space and infrastructure within retail stores leading to sub-optimal
management and storing of produce.

Failures and barriers with implications across the cold-chain

• Attention has been focused in India on cold storage rather than the cold-chain as a whole.
During the fieldwork, it was evident that policy-makers continue with an approach of
incentivising cold-rooms, instead of supporting the transfer of goods from farmgate to
retailers. In several states, such as Haryana and Maharashtra, current policy is to create
large cold-rooms instead of locating smaller cold-rooms/pack-houses close to farmgates,
which would facilitate better use of storage. The latter would also enable better mapping of
the release of produce to markets, resulting in maximised use of surplus food
• There is a lack of knowledge and skills which hampers the use of the cold-chain:
> There are varying literacy levels amongst farmers;
> Many farmers lack knowledge of optimum post-harvest care of produce;
> A lack of knowledge and skills about cooling equipment operation and maintenance -
hence, when equipment is available, it is often not used as effectively or efficiently as
it could be.
• There is a poor understanding among farmers and policy makers of the techno-economics
of the cold-chain, from farm to fork, and the benefits it can bring, in terms of reducing food
produce losses and maximising income to farmers.
• Market data does not reach farmers, preventing them from maximising the profit from their
produce. All the produce harvested in a given location tends to be transported from crop
clusters to the marketplace at the same time, creating a surplus and depressing produce
prices, and this is exacerbated in areas of crop clustering. If farmers could access timely
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information of market demand and pricing they could instead stagger harvesting and
release produce to the market at stabilized/assured pricing.
• There are no direct incentives to farmers to adopt cold-chain technologies, particularly
in comparison to schemes like ‘Minimum Sales Price of produce,’ which insures farmers
against contingencies.

2. Review of existing pack-houses

and cold-storage facilities
A review of the existing pack-house and cold-storage facilities in India found that there is
significant scope to improve the operating efficiency of units as well as increase the use of
alternate technologies. This would reduce emissions and increase the affordability for farmers.

Existing large format cold storage units are used for storage of potato seeds and apples, and less
commonly bananas, flowers and horticultural produce. Ice-production using brine is typically a
daily output for many cold-storage service providers and a predominant/assured revenue earner
for the cold storage unit, at least in certain seasons. Many of these units were built between 12
to 30 years ago, and attracted up to 40% funding from Government schemes for incentivisation.
Capacity utilisation is typically around 80% - in some cases lower. Older units have a basic
single compartment design, utilising masonry walls and external insulation, combined with
ammonia-based vapour compression cycle (VCC) refrigeration systems. Younger units have a
more sophisticated design featuring multiple compartments to store different products and
state-of-the-art equipment using Controlled Atmosphere (CA) with environment-friendly VCC
refrigeration systems. Solar PV systems for electricity generation have been installed on some
units, which can provide up to 10% of the operational energy required, but opportunities of
utilising solar-thermal systems have not as yet been explored.

Interviewees in the states of Haryana, Punjab, Maharashtra and Karnataka revealed that the
new projects implemented or planned under government schemes utilise the conventional
compression cycle - Freon-based technologies for pack-houses and cold storage. There is
considerable scope and opportunity to improve on the electricity consumption for these units
by providing clean, energy efficient and affordable solutions, particularly for large capacity
cold-chains.

Smaller cold-chains catering to 250 Megatonnes (MT) capacity pack-

houses are planned. However, they are based on conventional VCC using
Freon-based refrigerants, Ozone Depleting Substances (ODS), fossil fuel-
“FARMERS CAN GROW based grid electricity, and diesel vehicles, all of which will have high
ANYTHING, BUT THEY operational cost, and more environmental impact. The adoption of more
sustainable and resource efficient techniques and technologies would
CANNOT SELL” lead to lower operational costs and reduced environmental footprints
- Mr. Jagmohan Singh, for these proposed smaller cold-rooms.
Optimal Agro Food To date, there has been a limited focus on alternative technologies. There
Producer Company is however considerable opportunity to improve the resource efficiency
and reduce the environmental impact of the cold-chain through the
application of:

• Renewable energy technologies, including solar thermal;

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• Phase change materials (which can be charged using renewable energy sources; for use in
storage and transportation over reasonable distances;
• Waste heat recovery systems for cold storage and refrigerated reefers.

Furthermore, given the energy storage potential of cold food produce in cold-rooms, the FPCs
owning cold-room assets could also benefit financially from enhanced grid stability/demand
response projects, and could create revenue streams through net metering for solar-PV.

Simple architectural and design interventions, such as shading and improved insulation, can
be very effective in reducing the energy consumption of a cold-store and consequently help
reduce cooling related operational costs and environmental impact. Existing energy efficiency
building codes are not applied to cold-chain infrastructure in India. Also, current guidelines
pertaining to cold-chains focus on maintaining food quality and not on the energy efficiency
and sustainability of the system. This should be a consideration in the commissioning and
regulation of new aspects of pack-houses and cold-storage facilities.

3. End-to-end cold-chain – assessment of

impact on energy and emissions
Cold-chains can be major consumers of energy and contributors of GHG emissions and other
pollutants - directly through refrigerants, and indirectly through energy consumption. The
India Cooling Action Plan (ICAP) predicts that the energy consumption from the nation’s cold-
chains is likely to almost double in the next 10 years from 71 Terawatt hours (TWh) in 2017-
18 to 130 TWh in 2027-28, and increase further by 1.6 times (compared to 2027-28) to 212
TWh by 2037-38. (Ministry of Environment Forest and Climate Change, 2019). This increased
energy use corresponds to the technology adoption scenario considered in the ICAP and may
not necessarily reflect the actual real-world diffusion of cold-chains in India.

The ICAP projections are an important starting point for estimating the future cold-chain
requirements of India, however, they need to be better defined with respect to the anticipated
volumes of food. For example, India currently has the second highest yield of potatoes and
the highest yield of bananas in the world despite productivity of potato farming being half
that of the USA, Germany and Netherlands and that of the banana farming being at two-thirds
that of Indonesia (NITI Aayog, Govt. of India 2015). By the introduction of modern farming
technologies and practices, there is scope to improve average agricultural productivity and
overall yield. With the increasing involvement of large-scale Agri-food businesses and Quick
Service Restaurants (QSRs) in the sector, many farmers in India are moving in this direction.
However, the resulting increased output of perishable food will need a parallel deployment of
cold-chain infrastructure to support market connectivity and minimize produce losses. 

It is estimated that in India only 4% of the produce that could benefit from a cold-chain actually
does so, compared to around 70% in the UK (Birmingham Energy Institute 2017). A recent NCCD
report estimates that India currently needs 34 million metric tonnes of cold storage (10% more
than current); 70,080 pack-houses (as against the current 249); the 9,131 ripening chambers
(as against current 812); and 52,286 refrigerated reefer vehicles (as against the current 9,131)
(NCCD 2015). Achieving these targets may reduce agricultural food produce losses, but it
must not do so at the cost of environment and climate. In a business-as-usual scenario (i.e.
assuming that efforts to reduce the global warming impact of refrigerants are not increased
beyond current levels) the ICAP estimates that refrigerant demand will double from 2,500 MT
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in 2017-18 to 4,900 MT in 2027-28 and increase four-fold to 9,900 MT in 2037-38, which could
have a major impact on emissions.

There is scope to maximise energy conservation and reduce GHG and other emissions through
the application of new technologies throughout the cold-chain. Specific new technologies such
as Thermal Energy Storage Systems and Low Ammonia Charge Systems have the potential to
reduce GHG emissions by 30 – 100% and have zero or low ODP.

Assuming that a 30% improvement in energy efficiency can be achieved from alternative and
clean technologies and closed-loop systems, and using the ICAP projection figures for the
energy consumption of cold-chains in India by 2037-38, an energy saving of 105 Twh may be
achievable. The project team calculated this to be equivalent to 10% of the net available energy
in India in 2016-17 translating to a reduction of around 107 million tonnes of CO2 emissions.

Despite the potential benefits of clean cold-chain technologies, based on interviews with farmers
and FPO representatives, technology providers and government officials in Haryana, it is clear
that almost all of the current efforts for ‘Doubling Farmers’ Income’ are focused towards adding
cold-chain infrastructure using conventional ‘business as usual’ cooling technologies, rather
than emerging clean-cooling technology.

4. Clean cold-chain technologies

WHAT IS CLEAN COOLING?
‘Clean cooling’ is the delivery of comprehensive access to cooling efficiently and
sustainably within the CO2, natural resource and clean air targets. Clean cooling,
including clean cold-chains, necessarily must be affordable, financially sustainable
and accessible to all to deliver societal, economic and health goals.

There are many technical, logistical and investment challenges as well as economic
opportunities related to the use of the cold-chain in India. For example, In pack houses and cold
stores, conventional cooling technologies viz., grid-based electricity (which in India is largely
generated from the burning of fossil fuels) or standalone diesel-fueled generators as a power
source is used. To date, ammonia-based VCC systems have traditionally been deployed in India
in such facilities, as evident across the nation in the large-scale storage of potatoes. However,
ammonia-based low capacity and low-charge systems are being developed (Association of
Ammonia Refrigerants, 2018). Natural refrigerants such as ammonia have zero global warming
potential, as compared to the CFCs and HCFCs used in cold-chains of the Western world. The
latter typically have several 1,000 times the global warming potential of CO2, along with high
ozone depleting potential. However, one challenge related to using ammonia as a refrigerant
is that it has high toxicity and its increased use in the emerging cold chains of India will
therefore require greater focus on the safety aspects of design, operation and maintenance. This
might be a significant challenge in terms of education, training and skill development/ capacity
building, in addition to ensuring compliance to any regulatory environment established for
safety reasons.
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CLEAN AND ENERGY EFFICIENT COLD-CHAIN IN INDIA: EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

The principal technological innovations currently emerging in the area of cold-chains are
mainly related to the use of alternative sources of energy for cooling. It is estimated that across
the globe, the current requirement of cooling for refrigeration combined with requirement of
space cooling in buildings will together account for the largest share of electricity consumption
as well as GHG emissions. Renewable energy resources can be used, along with closed-loop
energy approaches, such as waste heat recovery systems, with-in the cold-chain to mitigate
the environmental impact of this demand and reduce emissions. Further, the demand itself
can be reduced by increasing energy efficiency that can be achieved through the application
of more efficient technologies such as, variable frequency drives, more sophisticated controls
and the Internet of Things. Development of more sustainable and resource efficient cold-chains
requires system level thinking, identifying the opportunities for the integration of efficient and
affordable clean energy technologies such as ‘free’ and waste energy recovery systems, across
the cold chain.

There is a wide-range of efficient (low energy consumption) and clean (low global warming
potential and low ozone depleting potential) technologies that are relevant to the flow of goods
along the cold-chain. Technologies that could be utilised in an efficient and clean cold-chain
include:

• Zero energy and low-cost vegetable storage using evaporative cooling at the farm, depending
on the ambient humidity conditions and technical feasibility at the farm site location;
• Phase Change Materials (PCM) for storage at the farm gate and first mile transportation up
to pack-house;
• PCM technology based solar-powered cold rooms;
• Concentrated solar thermal coupled with Vapour Absorption Machines (VAMs);
• Low Ammonia charge and CO2 brine system for cold storage of 50 tonnes of refrigeration
(TR) and above;
• PCM technology based refrigerated reefer trucks;
• Engine Exhaust Heat Recovery using a Matrix Heat Recovery Unit (for mobile and static
engines);
• Solar dryers and Atmospheric Pressure Vacuum Drying Systems, which can enhance the
value of produce with minimum cost, effort and environmental impact;
• Super heat recovery water heaters can be applied at any stage of the cold-chain to recover
waste heat, as well as utilise hot water for cleaning and washing applications in pack-
houses.

This study has found that clean and energy efficient technologies for cold-chain are available
in India. However, apart from a small number, they are still at the early adoption stage and
localisation through adaptation to in-country and regional, cultures, skills and practices, is
required. In order to accelerate the adoption of such clean technologies, government action is
required, that can include:

• Research and development related to affordable, sustainable, efficient and appropriate clean
technologies for specific farm clusters and crops. According to industry experts, currently
only around 4% of the Indian Council for Agricultural Research budget is for agricultural
extension services and engineering, including cold-chain. Therefore, the sector requires, a
significant increase in investment in research and development.
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CLEAN AND ENERGY EFFICIENT COLD-CHAIN IN INDIA: EXECUTIVE SUMMARY | 19

• Guidelines for energy efficiency in cold-chain facilities and extensions of appliance standards
and labelling programmes for commercial refrigeration appliances and facilities, taking into
consideration appropriate operation and maintenance practices.

• Capacity building programmes for technicians to be trained in energy efficient equipment

and appliances.

• Policies that create a suitable environment for financial models in order to help facilitate
access to finance for cold-chain investment and development.

5. Merit order of clean-cooling interventions

There are a variety of possible cooling interventions, its associated capital and operating
costs, energy demand and the potential of direct and/or indirect emissions of GHGs and other
pollutants. The study established a merit order of ranking to aid such decision making.

CLEAN COOLING INTERVENTIONS-DESCENDING

ORDER OF MERIT

Following is the list of interventions in the descending order of merit:

• Demand mitigation via behaviour or operating practice change – for example market
data driven harvesting of produce to avoid unnecessary storage and food loss;
• Demand mitigation via system or application design – for example efficient and
effective insulation and natural ventilation, and the use of shade;
• Making use of free cooling resources that are highly localised – for example evaporative
or sky cooling;
• Making use of more remote free cooling resources via district cooling type network
infrastructure – for example cooling systems that make use of bodies of surface water,
underground aquifers or industrial waste cooling such as that resulting from LNG
regasification;
• Making use of other free cooling resources via conversion technologies – such as
sorption cooling technologies capable of converting waste heat resources into cooling,
including engine exhaust heat recovery in refrigerated reefer vehicles;
• Energy consumption demand flexibility – for example via deploying thermal energy
storage to enable better integration with renewable energy resources;
• Optimum energy efficiency improvements and low GWP refrigerants in cooling
equipment selection – for example via enhanced performance or seasonal energy
efficiency rating (SEER);
• Sourcing of energy for cooling from renewable resources, including electrical power
from solar PV, wind turbines, small-scale hydro, biogas etc. and heat for sorption
processes from solar thermal and biogas;
• Sourcing of energy for cooling from the use of fossil fuel resources with carbon capture
and storage.
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CLEAN AND ENERGY EFFICIENT COLD-CHAIN IN INDIA: EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

COMPONENTS OF COLD-CHAIN IN INDIA

Cold-chain should enhance the income, economic wealth and financial security of farmers,
growers and fisherman and improve food quality, safety and value to consumers; and it should
achieve this sustainably with minimum environmental and natural resource impact and
with-in the CO2 natural resource and clean air targets.

FARMER’S
INCOME

RESILIENT ENVIRONMENT
NUTRITION

• Use of technologies such as zero-energy cold storage at the farm gate where farmers can
store their produce until transportation to the pack-house. This includes efficiently insulated
cold-rooms
• A cold store of 250 MT capacity located in close proximity (1 – 5 km) to the farm as a
component of post-harvest infrastructure, to include:
> Provision of an integrated pack-house with automatic sorting, grading and packing of
round fruits and vegetables (2 MT per hour), and an additional manual processing line
for other none-round produce;
> 2 pre-cooling units of 6 MT each; handling 2 batches of pre-cooling per day;
> 2 cold rooms of 125 MT each designed for a temperature range of 0 to 8 degrees centigrade
to suit the requirement of a variety of products. 

This facility should be a PEB steel structure, with insulated panel construction for the cold
rooms, and have a total plinth area of 1260 square metres. It should include: pack-house;
pre-cooling units using Ammonia DX system; cold rooms for staging using brine chillers and
thermal storage; ante room; loading/unloading docks; machine room; office; toilet.

• PCM based or exhaust heat recovery reefer trucks for transportation of produce to retail
market.
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CLEAN AND ENERGY EFFICIENT COLD-CHAIN IN INDIA: EXECUTIVE SUMMARY | 21

BUSINESS, TECHNICAL AND OPERATIONAL

IMPROVEMENTS

The research undertaken in the current study identified a suite of business, technical and
operational improvements that if adopted within food producer organisations (FPOs) and
businesses would support cold-chain development and use. These were as follows:

Create and develop strong FPOs, co-operatives and businesses

• Engage farmers in the operations by assigning roles and addressing the specific needs of
all members of a cooperative or business or FPO.
• Develop groups or committees within a clearly defined governance structure for the
better management of business, human and natural resources and technology.
• Assign tasks to experienced and literate members for dealing with paper work related to
government and banks.
• Create a legal cell headed by an FPO member or committee to scrutinise contracts,
address financial issues and profit distribution.
• Develop programs for members to engage beyond business ties through exhibitions and
social events, to foster engagement and build trust among members.
• Conduct regular training programs and talks to impart knowledge and share experience
among members.

Collaborate to expand market reach.

• Source new in-country markets with better prospects and/or export opportunities outside
India (perhaps include identification of new crops or cropping techniques).
• Develop entrepreneurship and negotiating skill sets among members.
• Negotiate collectively with end market retailers and route to market logistics providers
to obtain best deals on price and supply volumes.
• Resource planning - identify manpower, equipment and funds required for short and
long term improvement of the business across value chains.
• Negotiate collectively to purchase or access cold chain equipment and infrastructure to
obtain best deals on purchase price or usage fees.

Maximise effectiveness and efficiency of cold-chain.

• Plan for optimum utilisation of cold-chain – pre-coolers, cold storage, refrigerated reefer
and other facilities – making it economically viable.
• Conduct energy audits under State and Central Government schemes and upgrade
equipment and system – including adding non-fossil and renewable-based systems.
• Carry out the equipment manufacturers’ recommended maintenance and
service schedules to ensure efficient operation, and minimize energy cost and
environmental impact
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CLEAN AND ENERGY EFFICIENT COLD-CHAIN IN INDIA: EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

6. Recommendations
Based on the findings of the study, MP EnSystems Advisory Pvt. Ltd. and the University of
Birmingham have developed 4 core recommendations, and these are discussed in detail below:
• Promote new business models, specifically: ‘IT enabled services to manage harvesting and
logistics from fork to farm’ and ‘Cold as a Service’,
• Living Labs,
• Training,
• Hackathons and a framework for IT solutions.
These recommendations should be delivered in parallel and be combined with the steps being
taken by the Government of India in order to build a system-level approach, that addresses
the needs from the first to last mile of the cold-chain as well as those of the broader rural
community.
It should be noted that the business models are intended to take full advantage of information
flow from the demand side (market) to the supply side (production/harvesting). The existing
barriers highlighted in the research clearly indicate the need to build the capacity of operators
and stakeholders to make technology adoption seamless. Adding to the need for new business
models and training components, it is important to demonstrate the efficacy of new technology
and techniques. We propose the creation of technology exemplars through crowdsourcing
innovations such as Hackathons and create real-life living labs to demonstrate proposed
techniques and technologies.

RECOMMENDATION-1
Promote New Business Models – The development of new business propositions, specifically
‘IT-enabled services to manage harvesting and logistics’ and ‘Cold as a Service’.
BUSINESS PROPOSITION 1:

Carbon impact throughout the supply-chain - Direct (refrigeration) and Indirect (energy-use [focus on
thermal]) – new processes to include efficient and clean assets with substantive closed loops

FARM LARGE
MARKET

Village District Retail

Increased Income level Market
(INR) (farm-gate)
Farms transforming as agri-businesses Economic value (INR)

Fork to farm (flow of money and information)

Figure 1: Circular flow of information from fork to farm
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CLEAN AND ENERGY EFFICIENT COLD-CHAIN IN INDIA: EXECUTIVE SUMMARY | 23

IT enabled services to manage harvesting and logistics fork to farm

With increased penetration of mobile-based apps and technologies in rural areas, there
is a significant potential to leap frog into an information-based system that economically
empowers individuals to make informed marketing decisions and deliver increased financial
value for farmers. Similar projects have already been introduced in the agri-sector. Large-
scale dissemination through targeted programs can radically accelerate this phenomenon. The
proposed model would enable the assessment of the value of a fork-to-field flow of information
and explore the best way to capture and present data to farmers to support their immediate and
long-term commercial decision-making. Table 1 below sets out more detail of this proposition.

Table:1 Business proposition-1

IT-enabled services to manage harvesting and logistics

Primary goals:
• Linking the market requirement for fruits and vegetables with the time of harvesting.
• Reduce food produce losses in the supply chain by accurately linking time of harvesting, storage
and market.

Prospective businesses:
• Farmers’ Producers’ Organisations created subsidiary companies or business units.
• Social entrepreneurs supported through impact investors – start-ups with IT skills.
• Established Indian and overseas brands.

Pre-launch activities:
• Market assessments, understanding of holding life of produce in each of the food logistics supply
chains.
• Understanding of inventory management at the farm-gate, within haulage and at the markets
(wholesale and retail).
• IT platform development considering connectivity in the rural sector, data capture of commodity
prices etc.

Cost and revenue model:

• Initiation costs to include setting up of IT platforms, and development of Apps that operate robustly
with 3G/4G connectivity.
• Revenue generation through a subscription-based model – an annual fee to be charged to the group
of farmers and create advertisement sales.

Other benefits:
• Computer literacy within villages - including adult education and skills acquisition.
• Local youth engagement creating community IT hubs to assist villagers to access global platforms,
and associated job creation.
• Extension of logistics support services in health and educational systems.

BUSINESS PROPOSITION 2:
Cold as a Service
Rather than the conventional business-as-usual approach of selling cooling equipment to
farmers and burdening them with the capital and financing costs of aquiring the assets, an
alternative approach is proposed in which the specific thermal (hot or cold) requirements
necessary for establishing the food supply chain are assessed, alongside the broader needs
of local communities, and delivered by a third party through the most effective and efficient
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CLEAN AND ENERGY EFFICIENT COLD-CHAIN IN INDIA: EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

means. In such a model, cooling infrastructure becomes a service not a product, is funded by
potential asset owners such as entrereneurs or logisitics companies, and would be utilised
for multiple purposes in addition to agricultural production, including for example: storage of
vaccines and medicines; support to secondary agriculture and processing activities; preparation
and use of ice for fisheries, etc.

Table: 2 Business proposition-2

Cooling as a service that provides affordable access, improves market connectivity, and
maximises efficiency for the lowest carbon footprint.

Primary goals:
• Create affordable access to clean and efficient cold-chains – first and last-mile
transportation, cold-rooms with energy efficient and low GWP/ODS use systems.
• Promote waste-to-energy and solar-thermal/solar-PV systems to reduce use of fossil-based
systems.
• Create grid-support services through the use of cold-chain assets.
• Promote innovative technologies such as phase-change-materials and eutectic plates for
use in cold-store construction and transportation networks.

Prospective businesses:
• Energy service companies, equipment leasing companies and integrators creating a “pay-
as-you-go” model for number of hours of operations of cold-rooms and miles travelled
during the transportation phase.
• Farmers’ Producers’ Organisations created subsidiary companies or their business units
or social entrepreneurs carrying out the above-mentioned activities.

Pre-launch activities:
• Standardised designs for alternate refrigerants, alternate energy technologies.
• Understanding of operation and maintenance requirements.
• Development of a business model and plan to launch one service extended to multiple
states.
• Understanding of energy markets and possible renewable energy integration/grid-
support opportunities.

Cost and revenue model:

• Project development and implementation costs considering the Central and State
government subsidies/incentives available.
• Revenue generation through a monthly fixed fee and/or operating expenses benchmarked
to the use of cooling as a service.
• Cross-sale of hot water and secondary cooling to healthcare and rural industries.

Other benefits:
• Job creation for local young women and men involved in the operation and maintenance
services.
• Extension of logistics support services in health and rural industries, e.g. storage of
vaccines and medicines.
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CLEAN AND ENERGY EFFICIENT COLD-CHAIN IN INDIA: EXECUTIVE SUMMARY | 25

RECOMMENDATION-2
Develop Living Laboratories - A series of Clean Cold-chain Living Lab and Innovation
Centres to test, validate and demonstrate innovative and integrated solutions (technology and
business model) for sustainable clean cold-chains, as well as community cooling solutions, in
real world based controlled environments (see Community Cooling Hubs Table). These entities
will not only test and demonstrate the technologies but also the potential for climate change
mitigation, funding models, business models and approaches by governments. These labs will
be technology agnostic and identify the positive and negative consequences of deploying any
new interventions.
Labs will also be physically permanent entities with appropriately skilled and trained
staff complements, equipped with essential technologies and test bed facilities (packing, cooling
and/or temporary cold storage, leasing reefer vehicles and other equipment and tools for
improved postharvest handling), to provide training and advisory services through evidence-
based demonstrations. Audiences would include, local trainers, outreach teams, extension
service providers, growers, farmers, logistics operators and other stakeholders involved in food
supply chains. Labs would conduct training programs to build and improve local capacity and
share knowledge on improved technologies, business, marketing, etc.

RECOMMENDATION-3
Training - Development of a roadmap for awareness, training, skill development and capacity
building to address the technical, technological and social aspects of providing clean cold-chain
infrastructure. A training and skills programme should include seven key elements:
• Clean Cold-chain Living Labs and Innovation Centres (as described above)
• Business incubation training – to support the establishment and development FPOs,
Farmers’ Producers’ Companies, social entrepreneur organisations and businesses to
maximise prospective value-chains
• Enhanced IoT, AI and Block-chain applications - The Living Lab can provide the
knowledge base and platform to test the solutions arising from competitions and
hackathons virtually against specific targets in a safe environment. The Living Lab
can also embed real-time proof-of-concepts by creating on-going learning-by-doing and
doing-by-learning loops.
• Curriculum development for university students and professionals – for the
next generation of professionals who will be involved in the sector, across activities
which include: technology development; system design and build; financing providing
training or maintenance; and setting strategy and policy at local, national government
and with supranational agencies.
• Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) and e-Learning Programs – open access
online learning platforms to support and encourage mass participation of farmers and
other relevant stakeholders involved in the development and delivery of the cold chain
to learn about cold-chains and its benefits/impacts.
• Information and communication technologies (ICTs) – use of such technologies to
disseminate timely ‘fork-to-farm’ information for market-based harvest decision-making.
Interactive e-programmes and ideas should be used to reach wide range of audience and
transfer messages accurately, overcoming language, literacy or other related barriers.
• Written communication/ Publications – a wide range of various types of written
information should be used in order to provide information to the variety of audiences.
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CLEAN AND ENERGY EFFICIENT COLD-CHAIN IN INDIA: EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

ICT platform for

Reports, publications
informal e-engagement -
and farmer briefings
and platform for questions
(available on line)
and video workshops

Living Lab and MOOCs and

Training Centre University and E- learning
Technical Colleges

Business Incubation Inclusion in Academic and

Training Curriculum Technical Papers

Figure 2: Training and Development for Clean Cold-Chain Network Diagram

Source: MP EnSystems Advisory Private Limited and University of Birmingham

Additionally, information and knowledge building should include:

• Training for farmers on better management of produce both pre-harvest and post-harvest. 

• Development of interlinked R&D centres in existing agriculture universities to support cold-
chain related research and information required by farmers.
• R&D to study and support clean cold-chain technologies suitable to a region, preparation of
a roadmap for implementation and cost-benefit analyses.

RECOMMENDATION-4
Facilitate Hackathons and prepare a framework for IT solutions for developing clean
cold-chain in India using the latest block-chain technologies. Participants could include
representatives from FPOs, technology consultants and providers, government representatives,
funding agencies, bi-lateral organisations, consultants, and entrepreneurs, or interested
individuals and organisations including designers, programmers, coders, developers, recruiters,
CEOs. Participants could develop possible ‘open-source’ solutions and software codes for
developing, deploying and adopting a clean cold-chain either independently or in group.
This activity will require an informed needs assessment process developed with the farming
community, and the identification of the drawbacks, gaps and requirements of the existing
system. After, taking into account, existing schemes and infrastructure, it would address how
IT can enable enhancements achieved through cold-chain infrastructure and deliver value
back to the farm from the fork.
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CLEAN AND ENERGY EFFICIENT COLD-CHAIN IN INDIA: EXECUTIVE SUMMARY | 27

Policy action to support clean cold-chain implementation

In addition to these core recommendations, some policy recommendations have also been
identified, which would support Government of India’s objectives for doubling farmer income
and supporting a sustainable agriculture sector as a national economic growth engine.
Specifically, these are:
• Integration of national and state-level government schemes across ministries in order to
deliver a unified clean cold-chain program. This intervention will involve, but will not
be limited to the Ministry of Environment Forests and Climate Change, Bureau of Energy
Efficiency, State Agricultural Marketing Boards, as well as inter-state departments viz., IT
and Agriculture.
• Decentralisation of government schemes and subsidy programs with maximum outreach
through NGOs. Schemes should incorporate energy efficiency norms, standards and design
guidelines for installation and maintenance.
• Technical and administrative support for effective adoption of schemes.
• The provision of a voluntary star rating for cold-chain facilities to encourage efficiency and
create awareness
• Development of a model cold-chain to demonstrate end-to-end clean cold-chain infrastructure.
• Create a suitable environment for appropriate financial models to help facilitate access to
financing cold chains.

COMMUNITY COOLING HUBS

The provision of cold-chains to support food production and distribution is one very
important component of meeting the requirement for cooling in a rural community.
However, within such communities there are a broad range of cooling needs, which
include for example: veterinary and human vaccines and medicines; health services;
comfort; workplace and school house productivity; domestic refrigeration; commercial
services and in some cases humanitarian logistics. Currently, these needs tend to
be considered in isolation and, therefore, the cooling solutions for each is typically
delivered separately. An integrated Community Cooling Hub (CCH) is proposed by
the University of Birmingham as a more sensible systems - level approach which has
the potential to meet community cooling needs in a more efficient, affordable and
sustainable way.
Community Cooling Hubs would be focused on all social and development goals, not
just cold chains, and be built on the principle of community-ownership. They would
consider the wider opportunities - and unintended consequences - of cooling. An
assessment of local needs would provide the foundation for a localised portfolio of
clean cooling solutions.
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CLEAN AND ENERGY EFFICIENT COLD-CHAIN IN INDIA: EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

A CCH model should:

• Evaluate and aggregate cooling demand across the community (with food logistics as
the primary cooling load) to optimise system, enhance energy efficiency and manage
resources in a sustainable way .
• Combine system - level thinking with innovative ‘Cooling as a Service’ models – to
enable centralised services and maintenance, leading to better performance and
resource efficiency.
• Stack (bundle) revenues in business models to maximize the economic opportunity
for the local community.
• Not pre-suppose a technology solution but understand the portfolio of needs and
potential, matching the supplies in a sustainable way, and develop the optimum mix
of cooling solutions in order to meet those needs (see Merit Order Ranking box for
help on determining an appropriate mix of solutions)
• Harness free, waste to thermal, thermal to thermal solutions, and thermal storage

An example of the range of needs that could be met via a CCH is illustrated below:
• Food: precooling, packing and storage; food logistics; community domestic refrigeration,
retail refrigeration.
• Business opportunities: temperature-controlled spaces for third party food processing;
temperature-controlled stalls for vendors of fresh or short-life products; and ice
vendors.
• Community cooled meeting area providing comfort from the heat e.g. via shading, and
chilled benches. Could be used by school during the day and broader community in
the evenings.
• Human and animal health: secure vaccine and medicine storage; front-line disaster
storage; veterinary logistics; human vaccine and health logistics; and humanitarian
logistics.
Next steps to deliver Community Cooling Hubs
Through engagement with Pilot communities across a range of States, a collaboration led
by University of Birmingham working with MP EnSystems, Shakti Foundation, NCCD,
NIFTEM and IMechE intends to:

• Explore wider economic, environmental and social reasons to bring affordable cooling
to communities and understand collaborative economic and business models;
• Investigate the viability of integrating food cold-chains with other cold-dependent
services such as secondary agriculture, vaccines, community health facilities and
humanitarian logistics;
• Understand Willingness to Pay (WTP) and benefits of the business model vis-à-vis
Business-as-Usual scenario;
• Develop strategies and co-benefits to create sustainable community cooling services;
• Explore community refrigeration and common services models to be developed for
test-case communities in India assessed and evaluated through Living Labs.
 PROMOTING
CLEAN AND ENERGY EFFICIENT COLD-CHAIN IN INDIA: EXECUTIVE SUMMARY | 29

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 YEARS

towards a clean and secure energy future

www.shaktifoundation.in