May 2024, Delhi, India
Tabreed and Plaksha to test renewable energy integration with innovative thermal energy storage u
Plaksha University, a technology university reimagining higher education and research in India, has announced a groundbreaking partnership with Tabreed India to develop a living laboratory to test various energy storage technologies and its integration with smart microgrid at campus. Initially the partnership will test the integration of innovative phase change material (PCM)-based thermal energy storage with solar energy in a hostel building with the aim to decarbonise residential cooling energy consumption and minimise grid reliance.
As part of this first-of-its-kind Cooling as a Service (CaaS) contract for a university campus in South Asia, Tabreed India will take charge of Plaksha’s existing cooling systems to enhance energy efficiency and provide reliability commitments upwards of 98%. Besides research on thermal storage, Plaksha will experiment with consumption-based billing to foster behavioural change among users in the hostel.
Sudheer Perla, Managing Director, Tabreed Asia, says: “We are excited to partner with Plaksha University for a project that combines technology and business model innovation. Through implementing our planned innovations, we hope to demonstrate the cost and sustainability benefits of replacing battery energy storage with thermal energy storage (TES) systems, and the scalability potential of TES systems in the energy transition efforts underway. We aim to pave the way for other large university campuses, industrial parks, and Special Economic Zones (SEZs) to aspire for truly self-sufficient grid-independent campuses in the near future.”
The collaboration is part of the broader partnership between Tabreed India and IFC’s award-winning TechEmerge Program, through Cooling Innovation Lab (CIL), that aims to accelerate market adoption of innovative cooling technologies through the implementation of grant-funded pilots and innovative business models. This setup will demonstrate how the dual problem of variability in renewable power generation, which accounted for 70% of new generation capacity in India in 2023, and incremental night-time cooling demand can be addressed to minimise the need for conventional, more expensive, and less environment-friendly battery storage systems, thus bringing a sustainable vision for grid-independent buildings, campuses or even townships one step closer.
Vishal Garg, Professor and Director, Indorama Ventures Center for Clean Energy, Plaksha University says: “We are committed to leading the transition to sustainable energy through cutting-edge research and comprehensive educational programmes. A significant challenge in achieving our decarbonisation goals is the energy consumption in residential cooling. We believe that thermal storage, in combination with district cooling, holds great potential to overcome this challenge. To realise this potential, extensive research is necessary to develop innovative technologies, effective business models and supportive policies that also consider human-centric design and behavioural factors. Our collaboration with Tabreed India is a crucial step towards initiating this essential research”.
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About Tabreed India
Tabreed India Private Limited is a wholly owned subsidiary of Tabreed Asia Central Cooling Company, a 75/25 joint venture between National Central Cooling Company PJSC (Tabreed UAE) and World Bank’s International Finance Corporation (IFC). Tabreed is actively engaging with several leading real estate developers and institutional investors across the country to implement district cooling or ‘Cooling as a Service’ (CAAS). In 2023, Tabreed has been awarded a 32-year concession to develop Asia’s largest district cooling scheme of 125,000 RT for Hyderabad Pharma City in Telangana and signed a concession with Tata Realty to provide cooling as a service (CAAS) for their Grade A commercial campus in Gurugram for 6,600 RT. With strong design, engineering and development capabilities, Tabreed India continues to develop local supply chain and O&M capabilities to ensure global best practices could seamlessly be implemented in the country.
About Plaksha University
Founded by a global community of 100+ entrepreneurs, technology and business leaders, Plaksha envisions to reimagine technology education and research for India and the world. With strong partnerships with UC Berkeley, Purdue University, UC San Diego, Cornell University, IIT Madras, and IISc Bengaluru, Plaksha aims to nurture and empower a generation of catalytic leaders and create an ecosystem of research and innovation. The university collapses the traditional boundaries of engineering and promotes interdisciplinary learning by combining technology, design and entrepreneurship.
Plaksha is guided by an eminent academic board including Dr. Vijay Kumar, Nemirovsky Family Dean of Penn Engineering, University of Pennsylvania; Dr. Venkatesh Narayanamurthi, former Dean of Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences; Dr. Sriram Rajamani, Managing Director, Microsoft Research India; Dr. Julia Ross, Dean of Engineering, Virginia Tech; Dr. Krishna Palepu, Ross Graham Walker Professor of Business Administration, Harvard Business School; Dr. Sanjay Sarma, Fred Fort Flowers and Daniel Fort Flowers Professor of Mechanical Engineering, MIT; and business leaders such as Neeraj Aggarwal, Chair – Asia Pacific, BCG; Hitesh Oberoi, Co-promoter & CEO, Info Edge (Naukri.com); Srikanth Velamakanni, Co-founder, Fractal Analytics; Manas Human, Co-founder, Nagarro; Rakesh Bharti Mittal, Vice Chairman, Bharti Enterprises; Navin Chaddha, Managing Director, Mayfield Fund; Sujeet Kumar, Co-founder, Udaan.com; Dalip Pathak, Special Limited Partner, Warburg Pincus LLC; CP Gurnani, Co-founder, AlonOS; Pramod Bhasin, Chairman, Clix Capital, among others. Corporate donors include companies like Bharti Foundation, Havells, HT Parekh Foundation, Mphasis, Axis Bank and Motilal Oswal.
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