Lucknow: Realising its key responsibility for growth and development, the Uttar Pradesh government is addressing challenges of climate change and embracing heat-resilient infrastructure and urban sustainable cooling. Taking the first steps towards this essential goal, the UP-State Transformation Commission organised a high-level consultation here on Thursday, in partnership with the UN Environment Programme (UNEP), to help the state formulate a strategy to deal with increasing urban heat, which is known to adversely affect people's lives in many ways besides impeding economic growth.
Key Statements from Officials
“As UP grows rapidly, our responsibility is not only to build bigger cities, but safer and healthier lives. Sustainable cooling and stronger health resilience are essential to protect people—especially children, workers and the elderly—from the growing impact of extreme heat. The future of development must be humane, climate-sensitive and built around the well-being of every citizen,” said Manoj Kumar Singh, CEO of the state transformation commission, as quoted by TOI.
UNEP Global Chief Heat Officer Eleni Myrivili remarked, “There is immense potential for UP as it is growing fast and in days to come, it will see new infrastructure coming up… so if the right strategies are embraced now, the state’s development story will move ahead with sustainability.”
Anand Shukla, Senior Advisor at Swiss Development Cooperation, Switzerland, echoed this sentiment. “UP can in fact show the way to the rest of the country on this count,” he said. Citing an example, he noted: “The Noida International Airport, for instance, is India’s first large-scale infrastructure project to use Limestone Calcined Clay Cement (LC3) – a sustainable, low-carbon alternative that reduces carbon emissions by up to 40% compared to traditional Portland cement.”
Expert Recommendations
Other experts from UNEP listed areas in which UP can work, including developing sustainable and integrated cold chain systems among others. They also touched upon passive strategies such as the use of cool roof and green roof initiatives to check rising urban heat.
When asked to provide a five-point strategy that UP or any other state willing to work in this area can adapt, Eleni Myrivili said: “The first step could be taking a strategic and visionary resolve, which can be backed by strong political will to get the plan rolling.”
Acquiring knowledge to drive this vision is the next step. “Governments can undertake assessments, talk to stakeholders and do the mapping, while building data sets to draft the primary policy in the third step. The primary policy can be studied both vertically and horizontally to formulate bylaws and frameworks at this stage,” she said.
Adding that implementation plan was the fourth step, she said: “Action on the bylaws and frameworks through inventories like procurement guidelines incentivising eco-friendly construction come at this stage. The final stage is about monitoring and review so that the overall strategy may be improvised.”
