Marina Baur: Tell me about the role air conditioning currently plays in India and how this is changing as temperatures rise.

Neha Dhingra: I’ll start by saying that cooling—not just air conditioning, but mechanical cooling more broadly, including electric fans and evaporative coolers—is increasingly becoming a public health, economic, and development issue. The Indian government has actually added heat waves to its list of recognized natural disasters, which tells you how far-reaching their impacts are.

Over time, people have found many ways to stay comfortable on hot days, of course. India’s traditional architecture was designed to provide shade, breezes, and materials that absorb heat. And in the last few decades, electric fans have become very important in India; they’re now the primary cooling solution for most homes, schools, and workplaces.

But these measures aren’t enough for the heat we’re experiencing now. In June, temperatures in one city in Uttar Pradesh stayed around 48°C (118°F) for more than a week. I read recently that almost 5,000 cases of heat stroke have been reported in India this year, and that 20 people have died. Unfortunately, these numbers are almost certainly an undercount.

So keeping people protected in this kind of heat requires air conditioning. Past a certain temperature, fans just end up circulating hot air.

But most people in India don’t have access to AC. CLASP recently conducted research that showed that AC penetration in Indian homes is only about 13%.

This poses major challenges from an equity perspective. Many vulnerable communities lack even the most basic mechanical cooling appliances. Especially vulnerable are daily wage earners like construction workers, street food vendors, or vegetable sellers who spend their days working outside in the hot sun and have no air conditioning at home either. They’re at huge risk for heat strokes and other heat-related illnesses. And for them, being sick means they don’t earn any money. So there’s not just a health impact, there’s also an economic and productivity impact.

I’m optimistic that the new designation of heatwaves as natural disaster can unlock greater public investment in heat resilience and adaptation. This could help expand access to affordable, energy-efficient cooling for vulnerable households, as well as public spaces like schools and healthcare facilities.

But regardless of where this investment comes from, a technological shift is required. Clearly, the question is no longer whether India needs more air conditioning. The question is how we expand access to these appliances responsibly.

It’s not enough to just install more ACs in India, though—we also need to think very carefully about what kind of ACs people will buy. Will they be inefficient models that strain the grid and increase people’s energy bills? Or will they be efficient models that increase thermal comfort, reduce energy bills, reduce pressure on the electricity system, and avoid expensive investments in energy infrastructure that may only be required for a few hours each year?

Experts increasingly understand that efficiency is key, and that efficiency and access reinforce each other. The World Bank recently put out a report that listed AC efficiency as one of its top solutions for helping South Asian cities cope with extreme heat. It also cited India’s efficiency policies as a regional model.

This is the right time to be thinking about AC efficiency in India, since the demand for ACs is predicted to increase ninefold by 2050. Many advanced countries improved their AC standards only after these appliances were widely adopted, but here, a large share of air conditioners that are going to be operated are yet to be purchased. So there is an opportunity to influence the market before it’s fully mature.

Baur: You mentioned straining the power grid. Can you say more about how this plays out and how efficiency can prevent it?

Dhingra: The most important thing to understand is that efficiency allows India to expand access to cooling appliances without proportionally increasing electricity demand. This is key to grid stability.

There are two main challenges when it comes to the grid: the rise in total electricity consumed and the growing peak demand during certain times of day, when many people use their appliances at the same time.

Cooling appliances are one of the largest contributors to India’s peak demand. Every summer, as more people buy ACs, we see peak demand go higher and higher.

During extreme heat waves, when millions of people turn on their ACs at the same time, we see a particularly sharp increase in demand. But if you think about it, this only occurs for a few hours in a year. So it doesn’t make sense for the utilities to add power generation, transmission, and distribution capacity that remains underutilized for the rest of the year.

And it really doesn’t make sense when you think about the cost to consumers. Building this capacity across the country would be extremely expensive, and that cost would ultimately be paid as part of people’s electricity tariffs. So this is a kind of hidden way that inefficient ACs impact affordability, in addition to just raising electricity bills due to increased energy consumption.

Baur: So what are the solutions? How does India approach AC efficiency?

Dhingra: I’ll zoom out a bit and discuss the broader question of appliance efficiency, not just AC efficiency. One of India’s strengths has been recognizing that appliance efficiency is much bigger than regulation alone.

Efficiency standards provide an important market signal, but successful market transformation—in other words, making sure that the appliances people purchase and use are efficient—also requires appliance testing infrastructure, manufacturers, state governments, technical institutions, financing, consumer awareness, and continuous engagement across the entire value chain.

Policymakers in India have consistently worked at building an ecosystem for appliance efficiency in general, and AC efficiency specifically. They’re taking all these issues into account.

So policymaking is occurring as part of this larger process, within this larger ecosystem. And the policies that are being developed show this level of consideration. Starting in 2028, the minimum efficiency requirement for ACs will rise to a level that will dramatically raise the efficiency of products available in Indian stores. This will bring our efficiency standards up to the highest levels found anywhere in the world, comparable to China and Europe’s.

We’ve been talking about the importance of AC efficiency within India, but it’s also critical to understand how important this is from a global climate perspective. This policy will prevent a gigaton of emissions by 2050. It’s hard to overstate how important that is for broader mitigation efforts.

Baur: What are the main considerations that the government and other key players take into account when shaping AC policy and action in India?

Dhingra: One of the first questions is always, how are ordinary people going to get impacted? In other words, is the purchase price of the appliance going to increase if we improve efficiency?

That’s a key consideration, especially in a growing country where the AC penetration is low and access to cooling is a major challenge. Right now, the average price of an air conditioner in India is ₹35,000 INR ($366 USD), while the median household income is roughly ₹14,000 INR ($147 USD) a month. So policymakers don’t want to put these appliances further out of people’s reach.

That changed in 2020, when INMETRO, the federal agency responsible for appliance labeling, introduced a more rigorous classification system with a wider range of performance tiers.

Today, more than 60% of consumers report relying on appliance labels to guide their purchasing decisions. What’s more, 85% of the ACs sold in Brazil use inverter technology, which is more efficient than non-inverter alternatives.

“This shows that consumers have already understood that the most efficient equipment is also the best choice for everyday use,” says Hercules Souza, head of INMETRO’s regulatory division.

But labels alone didn’t drive this transformation. Brazil also aligned energy labeling, appliance efficiency standards, and endorsement programs (in which efficient units are recognized with a government seal) into a coherent policy package that accelerated the shift to more efficient technologies.

As Alexandra Albuquerque Marciel, an energy efficiency projects coordinator at Brazil’s Ministry of Mines and Energy, puts it, the key was “straight dialogue between the different agencies in charge of these policies.”

The government also enlisted the support of international appliance efficiency policy experts at CLASP. Our staff worked alongside Brazilian policymakers throughout this process, providing data, global insights, and technical analysis to inform policy design and align new regulations with global best practice while ensuring they reflected local market realities.

Industry was part of the solution

Policymakers often fear that strengthening appliance efficiency standards will have negative impacts on local industry. Brazil, home to the largest AC manufacturing sector in Latin America and the Caribbean, shows the opposite: Well-designed policies can actually strengthen domestic manufacturing.

From the outset, policymakers worked closely with manufacturers to set clear timelines, incorporate feedback, and allow time for transition. “Dialogue is super important,” Hercules Souza emphasizes. “Don’t do anything hastily . . . the [manufacturing] sector must be part of the discussion.” Without industry buy-in, he notes, policies risk being unrealistic or hard to implement, undermining progress.

Moreover, producing more efficient appliances allows manufacturers to compete globally. “Industry also has an international market to fulfill,” Alexandra Albuquerque Marciel says.

A model for other countries

The results of these efforts speak for themselves. The standards currently in place are expected to save 8 million megawatt-hours of electricity annually while avoiding 4 million tons of greenhouse gas emissions.

A planned revision in 2028 is projected to expand these impacts dramatically, achieving electricity savings of 284 million megawatt-hours—nearly four times the amount of electricity Itaipu, one of the world’s most productive hydroelectric plants, supplies to Brazil each year. This will reduce grid stress, lower costs for consumers, and cut greenhouse gas emissions.

Solar energy is key to helping more Indian farmers access cold storage units, making it possible to locate this equipment in rural areas, where the power grid is often absent or unreliable. Solar-powered systems offer dependable, affordable solutions for storing produce close to where it is grown.

India’s government is working to help more farmers access this important solution. Energy Efficiency Services Limited, a joint venture under the Ministry of Power, is collaborating with CLASP to expand access through the Low-Energy Inclusive Appliances (LEIA) programme, a flagship research, development, and demonstration initiative under Efficiency for Access.

The collaboration began with the installation of six micro solar cold storage units across the states of Andhra Pradesh, Gujarat, Himachal Pradesh, Karnataka, and Odisha. Financing from The Asia Development Bank covered 75% of the capital costs, with farmers paying the rest.

There are now plans to deploy up to 150 units nationwide, unlocking $3.6 million in financing from the Indian government, private investors, and farmers (who are receiving loans to help cover their costs).

This effort will one day reverberate across India’s economy. For farmers like Lokratnam, however, the benefits are immediate and tangible.

“Now, with the cold storage, we are able to keep our custard apple, tamarind, and honey fresh and sell them later,” she said, referring to high-value crops. “It has changed everything for us, bringing profits without any losses.”

For more than 90% of the world’s population, cooking typically involves burning fuels like gas, wood, or animal dung to heat food. As these fuels are polluting, preparing food has consequences far beyond the kitchen, affecting public health, air quality, and climate.

But for billions of people, cleaner cooking isn’t an option due to a lack of access to electricity, electric cooking appliances, or both. Moreover, many people are reluctant to switch to electric cooking. Often, this reluctance is rooted in misconceptions about taste, convenience, or affordability.

Nyamolo Abagi wants to change this. As a leader of CLASP’s electric cooking work, she collaborates with policymakers, manufacturers, and clean cooking advocates to communicate the wide-ranging benefits of electric cooking (also known as e-cooking) and make the technology more accessible across the Global South.

Abagi spoke with CLASP’s Marina Baur about this work.

Marina Baur: Electric cooking technologies have been around for a long time, but it seems like momentum is growing behind the idea that transitioning to them could really benefit society as a whole. Why is this happening now? What’s changed to make this a viable option globally?

Nyamolo Abagi: The one requirement for electric cooking is reliable electricity supply to run your appliance, whether that’s an induction stove, oven, or electric pressure cooker. And in the Global South, where millions of people still live without power, that’s not always a given.

But over the last 10 years, we’ve brought electricity to a lot more homes. So now we’re facing a massive opportunity. We have millions of people who are newly connected to electricity, often via distributed renewable energy, but they’re only using if for very basic energy services like lighting, phone charging, or watching TV. There’s a huge opportunity for e-cooking around the world to scale.

Another important factor is that e-cooking technologies today are mature and ready to scale. Over the last few years, these appliances have become extremely efficient.

And current events are underscoring just how important the transition to efficient, electric cooking appliances is. The geopolitical tensions in the Middle East are exposing the fragile nature of our energy fuel supply and leaders across many regions fear that gas shortages may affect people’s ability to cook.

As a result, we’re seeing a huge spike in induction cooktop sales. For example, last week Amazon India recorded a 20-fold increase in demand within 24 hours compared to a normal day.

This current moment is a powerful reminder that the transition to electric cooking is about far more than climate alone—it’s also about resilience and energy security—and the time to leverage these benefits is now.

Baur: Even as interest in e-cooking grows, people have cooked with fuels like wood since early in human history. What other benefits could make them want to switch to?

Abagi: Probably the biggest benefit is health. CLASP did extensive research in Europe into the health impacts of cooking with gas stoves, and the data clearly showed that households using gas breathe in twice as much indoor air pollution as those with electric appliances. You can imagine what the numbers might look like for households with a biomass stove. This indoor pollution can be linked directly to respiratory diseases like asthma, and it leads to coughing, wheezing, and increased hospital visits, particularly for vulnerable groups like children.

And now imagine this in a Global South context. Across Africa and Asia, more and more people are moving into cities, where they often live in densely populated apartment complexes. Yet many people, especially the lower middle class, are still cooking with a biomass or charcoal stove. Whether they’re cooking in their kitchens or on their little balconies with the door open, there’s a lot of smoke coming into their homes. In tightly packed, often poorly ventilated buildings, that’s only going to exacerbate the issue of indoor air pollution.

Besides that, cooking on an open flame increases the risk of fire and fire-related incidents. Imagine a family with kids. Kids tend to be very curious, and they might accidently tip over the charcoal stove and end up with a first-, second-, or third-degree burn. This is actually quite common.

And—this is something I only recently realized myself—induction cooktops, with no open flames, no harmful gas residue, lightweight designs, and touch‑based controls instead of knobs, are revolutionary for differently abled people with limited mobility. They can be operated safely, moved easily, placed on the floor, and even used with toes, restoring independence in ways I hadn’t previously imagined.

Many of these health and safety aspects also extend to institutional settings. Think about schools, hospitals, or prisons where cooks prepare meals for thousands of people every day. In sub-Saharan Africa, most of these kitchens still rely on biomass such as wood. Studies have shown that temperatures in these big kitchens are upwards of 10 degrees Celsius hotter than ambient temperature, and humidity is also high. Now imagine that’s your job that you go to every single day. Transitioning to electric cooking would be a big step to ensure the health and safety of these folks who are responsible for feeding our children and sick people.

Transitioning away from wood stoves in institutional kitchens can also have huge environmental benefits. Right now, most have to cut down so many trees to heat their food that both policymakers and the institutions themselves have recognized the need for change.

And think about what this could mean for utilities. Some people believe that e-cooking would burden the grid, but this is a myth. If done right, electric cooking can actually help strengthen the energy system. This is because utilities make money by selling electricity. When they connect more homes to the grid, they often have to borrow a lot of money to build that infrastructure. But if those households barely use electricity, as is the case in many parts of the Global South, how do utilities pay that money back? That’s a chicken and egg problem. We need electricity to be more reliable, but utilities have little incentive to invest in improvements if they are not earning enough.

That’s where e-cooking can come in. It increases everyday electricity use in a predictable way, which gives utilities more income and a stronger reason to keep the power reliable.

There’s another aspect to e-cooking that I’m really excited about: It creates huge economic opportunity. Imagine all the new green jobs for retailers, technicians, importers, manufacturers, and improved economics and working conditions for small businesses that prepare food.

With the population growing quickly and unemployment rising, youth employment is a big concern for many African governments right now. Including electric cooking in a jobs strategy is a triple win for jobs, climate, and health.

I have visited assembly plants in Asia that manufacture electric cooking appliances. CLASP is incubating one here in Africa that is doing all of its welding locally.

And the even bigger opportunity is what could happen through South–South collaboration, for example between India and countries in Africa, or India and Nepal. There is real potential for knowledge transfer and joint ventures. This might mean Indian companies partnering with African distributors or manufacturers who understand local markets. It could even mean acquiring some of the businesses we are helping to grow. If that happens, that would be a great success story; it’s how markets mature.

Baur: If the benefits are so massive, why isn’t this happening faster? What’s holding things back, and how can we get past those challenges?

Abagi: In many countries—including Kenya, where I’m taking this interview from—electricity is expensive and often still unreliable. So for a lot of people, e-cooking is a dead-on-arrival message. It is a bit like telling me about a luxury electric car. I might say, “That sounds great, but I cannot afford it.”

But the picture is more complicated than it seems. If you do a dish-by-dish comparison, you will find that e-cooking is not only more efficient but also actually more affordable than gas or biomass. So misconceptions around affordability are one of the biggest bottlenecks we need to overcome as stakeholders in the energy access and clean cooking space. What we can do is generate strong data and evidence to show utilities that energy-efficient, affordable technologies already exist and that there are practical ways for customers to procure them.

With the right data, we can also get utilities’ support in strengthening the e-cooking ecosystem. For example, to address affordability concerns, utilities could experiment with a dedicated tariff for electric cooking. Internet of Things technologies now make it possible to collect detailed usage data. Some of these devices are very simple: you plug them into the wall, then plug the cooking appliance into it, and it captures meter data on how often the appliance is used and how much electricity it consumes.

With that kind of information, a utility could design a tariff specifically linked to electric cooking that is slightly lower than the standard rate. That could serve as a practical incentive to encourage people to cook with electricity more regularly, including at an institutional level.

There are also other barriers to overcome. The shift to e-cooking isn’t just about technology or money; culture also plays a big role. What many people really care about is stuff like, “Is my food going to taste as good as my grandmother’s dishes if I shift away from the cooking methods we’ve been using for generations?”

Fortunately, it’s easy to demonstrate that food cooked with electricity can be delicious, and that many traditional recipes can be cooked this way. Take pressure cookers, for example—they’re so efficient that you’re preserving a lot more of the flavors and nutrients in your food. I wish I could do a blind taste test with people that are attached to the idea that food cooked on biomass tastes better. I’m sure they would be surprised.

Additionally, I’m not saying that 100% of the dishes have to be prepared using electricity. Wherever you are in the world, we’re all using different appliances in our kitchens: You might have an oven, a toaster, a microwave, a blender, an air fryer, and so on. So when we talk about transitioning to e-cooking, what we’re advocating for is to move households toward electric cooking as their primary cooking method, covering about 70% of our cooking needs. There will always be some dishes that have to be prepared in different ways—some people have wood-fired pizza ovens; others may enjoy grilling in the summertime. For these special cases, it’s fine for people to keep using biomass, as a way to preserve culture and tradition.

Another aspect people don’t like to talk about is that policymaking around cooking is often male-dominated, even though women do most of the cooking. This creates a disconnect between lived experience and policy design – and momentum for change.

Whenever I speak to policymakers, I joke with them that we would solve this issue today if they would pass a law that men have to do all the cooking for one year. Men would still have to do their other jobs and then come home and cook the meals.  And of course, the moment men had to cook every day after work, I have a strong hunch the first question they would ask is: “surely there must be better way to do this?”

Think about cooking beans, for instance. If you have ever cooked beans on a gas or charcoal stove, you know it’s complicated. You’re constantly wondering: Did I pour too much water? Did I seal the pot properly? Is it going to bubble over and create a big mess? With a pressure cooker, I no longer worry about these things. I can turn it on, be in a Zoom call, and even if I completely forget about it, the pressure cooker is going to turn itself off when it’s done, and my beans will be waiting for me, warm and ready to eat.

Motors are the invisible heartbeat to economic progress. They are found across industrial facilities, powering production lines for goods like metals, paper, cement, textiles, and packaged food and beverages. Energy efficient motors and their associated components are key tools to enable economic growth, but inefficient ones can hinder progress via high energy demand and associated costs.

Efficient motors systems offer a golden opportunity for all countries –from existing economic powerhouses to newly industrializing nations– to expand and thrive in global markets while simultaneously slashing energy costs and emissions.

Industrial motors, like those found in factories, are part of a system of several components. When evaluating efficiency, governments and the private sector must look at and address the whole system, from power source to mechanical output. These systems are responsible for powering many recognizable factory features like conveyer belts and air compressors.

Without intervention to ramp up efficiency, motor systems will account for 25% of global energy demand and 33% of global energy related emissions by 2050.

And these inefficiencies are expensive: continued use of outdated motor systems will be responsible for $9 trillion of lost GDP in 2050.

Outdated and inefficient motors represent two-thirds of today’s global stock. These motors can last upwards of 15 years, locking countries into a future of high energy consumption, unnecessary emissions, and strained power grids.

Increasing the market share of efficient motor systems for all economies offers significant and sustained benefits. A timely transition will require leaders to push the boundaries on policymaking and financing.

Heavily industrialized countries, like China and the European Union, need to replace existing inefficient motor stock with the most efficient IE5 compliant technologies and pair them with variable speed drives to achieve the biggest cost and climate benefits. This move can be catalyzed by ambitious efficiency policy and will require significant financing support from sources like industrial banks.

In countries where manufacturing is expected to grow significantly, with commensurate increase in motor stock, like Nigeria and Indonesia, quick government action to incentivize or require efficient motor systems in new factories will prevent runaway emissions and costs from the start. External financial support and mechanisms, like subsidies and bulk procurement, will be critical for supporting emerging industry.

In recent years, Brazil has taken initial steps toward a more sustainable future powered by energy efficiency. As the host of COP30, held in Belém in November, Brazil put a spotlight on this smart climate solution for the world to see.

The country is already a global leader in sustainable energy, generating 89% of its electricity with renewables. However, rapidly rising energy demand and decreased hydropower capacity are forcing policymakers and utilities to reevaluate the current energy mix.

Global warming and Brazil’s deep income inequality further complicate this challenge. For example, Brazil’s summers are growing hotter; in 2023, the country hit a new record temperature of 112.6° F (44.8° C). As a result, air conditioning, once considered a luxury, is becoming necessary for health and productivity. But today, air conditioning is found in only 20% of all homes, concentrated mainly in higher-income households.

The challenges lower-income Brazilians face in accessing energy services like air conditioning are reflected in the fact that almost half of the lowest-income Brazilians spend more than half of their household income on electricity and gas.

So reducing the demand for mechanical cooling is the first step. And then once we get that as low as it can go, we need to meet the remaining demand in a way that’s as climate-friendly as possible. That means paying close attention to electricity and refrigerants, which are the two main sources of emissions.

The electricity emissions come from burning fossil fuels in places where the electricity used by ACs is produced with oil, gas, or coal. Because a lot of electricity is produced this way, ACs are indirectly responsible for a large volume of emissions. That’s why it’s important to use efficient equipment. As we reduce the amount of energy needed to run ACs, we can reduce the amount of fossil fuels burned.

Refrigerants are also really important. They’re classified in terms of their global warming potential, which is extremely high for some refrigerants. One of the most common ones used in air conditioners, R-410A, is 2,000 times more potent than carbon dioxide.

The world is moving away from refrigerants that have high global warming potential, but that transition is not happening as fast as it should. The transition is being driven by commitments many countries made under the Kigali Amendment of the Montreal Protocol to phase down and phase out these refrigerants. But national regulations are needed to speed the process, and in many countries there is no regulation.

Wesseler: OK, so electricity use and refrigerants make ACs problematic from a climate perspective. How problematic, specifically? How much of a climate risk does AC pose?

Carreño: Well, data from CLASP’s appliance efficiency policy model, Mepsy, show that the projected emissions in 2030 from room air conditioners alone—so not counting any other type of space cooling, like fans—are about 800 megatons, which is almost a gigaton. That’s roughly equivalent to driving 186 million gasoline-powered cars for a year.

We’ve also found that, to achieve net zero scenarios by 2050, emissions from the entire appliance sector need to fall by nine gigatons by 2050. So when you consider that room air conditioners will reach one gigaton of emissions in 2030, that tells you the magnitude of the challenge AC poses for the climate community.

What makes this even more difficult is that, at the same time that we need to reduce emissions from AC, we need to help more people get access to air conditioners.

For many years, the efficiency community talked about air conditioners being a luxury—something that was only for households with the capacity to purchase the equipment and pay high electricity bills. But now summers are becoming so hot in many places that it’s almost impossible to stay healthy, to work, to study without AC. But there’s still very low access to air conditioning in Southeast Asia, Latin America, and Africa.

Brazil is a good example. Only 20% of households there own an air conditioner—most people use fans for cooling since they’re cheaper than AC. But the summers are becoming hotter and hotter. This year, the temperature reached 44° Celsius (111° Fahrenheit) in Rio de Janeiro. In heat like that, fans are no longer enough to keep people cool.

Brazil actually set a new record for air conditioner sales in 2024 because of the growing heat. There were six million new ACs sold, which is a 38% increase from 2023.

This same kind of growth is happening in other countries as well. The IEA (International Energy Agency) has forecast that demand for cooling will triple by 2050.

Wesseler: You mentioned that regulations are critical to reducing the climate impact of ACs. What kinds of regulations are most effective?

Carreño: National governments have various policy options. The most popular, and the most effective, are energy efficiency standards. With standards, governments essentially say, “All ACs sold in this country have to operate above this specific level of efficiency.”

Of course, there’s more to it than simply setting the efficiency level. The policy has to be widely communicated to industry—manufacturers, importers, and others—and there have to be mechanisms for testing and certifying products for compliance. But in general, standards are a relatively simple and very effective tool for removing the least-efficient products from the market.

Another important policy is labeling. Labels are a consumer-facing tool; you use them to inform consumers about the different levels of performance of the equipment available on the market. So if you’re interested in purchasing an appliance that uses less energy, that has less impact on the climate, you can easily identify those products using this simple label system.

Some governments also use incentives to promote the purchase of more efficient appliances. Public procurement is a very good incentive. Many governments purchase massive amounts of equipment for official buildings, for municipalities. When policymakers require high efficiency and low climate impact as part of this process, that incentivizes manufacturers and importers to bring in more equipment that meets those criteria. It’s an important lever.

Governments can also provide incentives to help consumers replace obsolete appliances they already own. There are a lot of examples of replacement programs for refrigerators, for instance.

Governments can also support local industry in upgrading appliance production lines. This is something CLASP is looking into in Brazil and India. Brazil produces about 90% of the air conditioners used in the country, and it already has good efficiency standards, but the idea is to support the domestic production of high-efficiency equipment and continue raising the level of ambition. We’re working with the Brazilian Agency for Industrial Development to incorporate energy efficiency into its programs. That’s turning out to be a very, very interesting program.

Wesseler: So it sounds like AC policy can be a win/win for the public and private sectors—it’s not necessarily punitive for manufacturers.

Carreño: Yeah, and this is a really important point. In general, countries’ AC policies are led by countries’ ministries of energy. Reducing energy demand and improving energy security is front and center for these ministries, of course, but they also assess the impacts of these policies on industry and consumers. And that means that policies cannot increase the price of the equipment for consumers or impact local manufacturing. That’s a challenge, because when you improve AC policies, sometimes local manufacturing is going to be impacted. So it’s important to work with local industries so they can continue to be competitive. In some cases, these upgrades can improve their competitiveness in export markets, too.

But this is the main challenge for AC policy in many of these countries. For many years, it’s the reason why policy progress has been slow.

Wesseler: Which countries are doing the most interesting things on AC policy today?

Carreño: China has the current world-leading standard for air conditioners, and the government is looking to go even farther. It’s trying to improve the technology itself, investing in research and development with the goal of doubling the efficiency of cooling equipment. The idea is that when that technology is available, that higher level of efficiency will become the new policy standard. So China is really pushing the envelope.

Brazil is another good example of where policy has really shifted the market to efficient products. For many years, Brazil didn’t revise its AC policies, but this has changed, partly because of efforts by the advocacy community in Brazil. So when the new AC label was published five years ago, followed by a new standard two years later, it really shifted the market to very efficient products.

India is also interesting. The government essentially sets up a schedule that gives manufacturers notice on what efficiency levels they need to reach in future years, helping them understand how policies will change over time. I think that’s a very good practice.

Excerpts from this article first appeared in Business Daily Africa in the lead-up to the second Africa Climate Summit in 2025.

By centering climate responses within Africa’s development needs, the continent can unlock new investments, boost incomes, and enhance its resilience. As leaders gather in Addis Ababa for the Africa Climate Summit, the continent must define a bold narrative that strategically links climate action with development progress.

Climate change should not be a global emergency that Africa is simply signing up to solve. This crisis is already costing Africa billions every year, and an estimated 110 million people have been directly affected by climate-related hazards.

Climate action can and must be made to work for Africa by recasting it through an Africa-centered development lens. Responses to the climate crisis offer Africa an opportunity to leverage climate solutions and sustainable technologies to increase incomes, accelerate poverty reduction, and improve adaptation and resilience.

African and global leaders will be converging at the second Africa Climate Summit in Ethiopia from 5 to 10 September. When we gather in Addis Ababa, we must use the Summit as a platform to drive bold reforms and ambitious actions that can repurpose climate change solutions to address Africa’s core development imperatives.

Framing climate action as an opportunity for Africa’s development

Income growth and poverty reduction remain as Africa’s core development pathway, the rising tide that promises improvements across all other social, economic and political indicators.

Africa’s income growth and poverty reduction needs are clear. The average GDP per capita of Sub-Saharan Africa was $1,506 USD in 2024, 40% lower than middle-income countries, and 90% lower than upper upper-middle-income countries. The continent’s GDP grew by 3.3% in 2024. That annual growth rate must increase to approximately 19% on average for GDP per capita to double by 2030. The continent’s GDP must multiply seven times over for African countries to reach middle-income country status.

The pathway to income growth and poverty reduction is equally clear. Africa must increase investments several-fold to drive economic growth, create new jobs, increase productivity, improve competitiveness and enhance social services. Sustained economic growth will result in higher incomes, delivering the poverty reductions that are urgently needed.

Climate change response strategies can be repurposed to meet Africa’s income growth and poverty reduction goals in two ways. First, climate solutions can free up investments, which can then be more productively deployed to drive economic growth. Second, climate solutions can be used to reduce climate vulnerability, improve adaptation, resilience and enable sustained economic growth.

Climate solutions can free up investments for economic growth

Energy efficiency can help secure the emissions reductions that the world needs to achieve to minimize the harshest impacts of the climate emergency. Improving energy efficiency also means lower utility bills for consumers and businesses, and less demand on power grids for governments. The International Energy Agency (IEA) estimates that Africa currently uses 3.7 gigajoules (GJ) of energy for every thousand USD of Gross Domestic Product (GDP). By transitioning to a higher efficiency of 2.7 GJ per thousand USD of GDP by 2030, consistent with IEA’s net zero emissions pathway, Africa could save billions through avoided energy and infrastructure costs. These avoided investments could then be productively deployed for economic and income growth in areas where they are needed.

Climate solutions can reduce climate vulnerability

Climate change is already costing Africa 2-5% of its GDP, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) estimated. In Sub-Saharan Africa, for example, that translates to approximately $ 40 – $100 billion USD of lost incomes in 2023 – money that could have been utilized to enhance economic growth or support social services.

Africa bears a disproportionately large share of climate impacts because the poor and vulnerable are the least prepared to face climate vulnerabilities when they occur. The WMO projects that by 2030, 118 million extremely poor people in Africa will remain highly vulnerable to climate impacts such as heat stress, droughts and floods.

Energy-efficient appliances, such as lights, fans, air-conditioners, refrigerators, electric cookers, water pumps, cold storages, and milling equipment, are crucial to building adaptive capacity and resilience to climate change among the world’s most vulnerable populations. CLASP estimates that more than half of the population in Africa lacks access to many essential appliances, such as fans and refrigerators. There are equally large ownership gaps for agricultural equipment, such as water pumps, milling equipment and cold storage. These appliances are critical to helping reduce the risks of income and productivity losses from climate impacts.

CLASP estimates that increasing access to seven key appliances across Africa could create a market worth approximately $50 billion USD and catalyse accelerated power infrastructure development to provide electricity for all. It would improve people’s access to essential services, helping individuals manage environmental stressors and economic instability.

Climate change was not Africa’s making, but it is Africa’s fight to shape. If leaders gathering at the Africa Climate Summit in Ethiopia can reframe the response to the climate crisis as an opportunity to accelerate income growth and poverty reduction, then climate action will not only protect the vulnerable but also power the continent’s prosperity. The future is not about choosing between climate action and development; it is about making climate action the very centre of Africa’s development.