Industrial Automation Magazine India

The future of energy is decentralised, decarbonised and digitised

Published on : Tuesday 30-11--0001

What are the top Mega Trends you see for India?

These Mega Trends are all applicable globally as they are to India. Speaking about India, I would say there are a few that are more prominent than the others. Digital Transformation is big, and will get bigger with 5G coming in soon. There is also a big buzz about Cloud in India and the impact it will have on multiple industries, for example in the energy sector. I think Artificial Intelligence is another area, which I fear, has both positive and negative consequences as job losses could be serious, especially since India is still not a manufacturing economy yet unlike China. The next is Health, which is big in India and will get bigger. Mobility and Energy too are among the big trends. Other, more serious, is a social trend in India, which, as a Heterogeneous Society is now riven by factors like gender, caste, religion, political affiliations, etc., and getting more polarised. How do we deal with this is very important. Finally, an interesting on is the rise of Dark Industries. By dark industries I mean small enterprises that are set up to be close to the consumers, e.g., the food industry where delivery is now a big business – setting up kitchens close to distribution, warehouses for facilitating ecommerce, small job shops to supply parts to industries.

You have also referred to something called Vision Zero strategy – what is this?

Yes, and this is not so much a trend, I call it Vision Innovating to Zero, that’s where you set up vision zero strategy. Britannia in this case is a good example where they set up vision zero malnutrition in kids with its fortified products to deal with iron deficiency. It is that kind of vision – carbon neutral factories or even cities – it is things like this.

What kind of impact AI is likely to have in manufacturing and other industries as opposed to service industries where it is significant?

Yes, in manufacturing industry AI is not yet matured and still some way to reach the peak. There is no factory today that is completely Industry 4.0 compliant, even as there are first examples already functional. When it peaks, will it have an impact? The answer is yes, and again there are two ways of looking at it. Take commercial aviation as an example – earlier there were three pilots, now there are two and in future there could be just one human, the other being digital. Now will this be good or bad? Of course there are some bad cases recently, but in a typical scenario a computer is much faster than the human mind. So it depends how we respond to it. If AI can help a surgeon in the operation, will it not be used? Similarly in factories if it boosts productivity and helps make the lines more flexible for manufacturing different products?

Talking of the energy sector, in particular the distribution part, large parts of the country are still experiencing low voltage as well as power outages. Is there a serious mis-match?

One has to look at what has been achieved. Just about 15 years ago, even Delhi suffered serious power deficiency – it was a chaotic situation. It is amazing how it has been bridged. But there are questions – is our energy clean, or is it reliable? There is still a lot of work to do in this area. My own feeling – and the belief of our team – is the future of energy is decentralised, decarbonised and digitised. India, I think, on all three fronts is slow. Australia for example has declared it will not build any new coal fired plant. Germany has backed out of nuclear, supplementing that with other means, and is investing heavily in renewables. So in India there needs to be a lot of impetus to decentralise and decarbonise electricity and having more smart energy meters, and smart grids.

India has set an ambitious agenda for electric mobility. Can this be put into practice, especially with the public transport network inadequate?

To have 100% electric cars by 2030 sounds a bit ambitious. Could we have say up to 30%? The answer is yes. Is electric real? The answer is yes, again. The electric car is a reality and with battery prices coming down would become viable. What India needs at the moment is have a cradle-to-grave analysis of the industry, invest in battery technology and production, where it does not figure anywhere in the global production capacity as of now. India needs to take a lead in this. We also need to build a charging infrastructure, as it is a large country and the distances one has to travel are great; but you are right, the biggest area is to build an effective network of public transport, which is lacking at present.

Coming to sustainability, say, for example in cargo movement where up to 30% of the fleet moves empty, be achieved with technology?

The answer is yes, technology offers a solution. Cargo movement is a very good example – we have studied this and call it Uber for Trucks. How can you aggregate demand in real time? Say I am a truck driver and have a trip to deliver, so can I get a job on the fly for the return trip? Yes, this is possible, though the technology is not yet ready, not yet embedded in the truck or the smartphone. We have to make it happen and it is a work in progress.

It is a cliché, but what are the three things India can do at this stage to remain competitive globally?

There are a few things India needs to do and the first is to build a lot of manufacturing, which has to be fully sustainable, and in new industries. There is a lot of gap in the market between electrical and electronic products which India can plug.

Secondly, India has to find a new way to help start-ups and entrepreneurs. We do not have that ecosystem presently. If you look at China or the US – China has Didi and Alibaba, the US has companies like Google or Amazon. We just do not have any iconic trademark out there.

Thirdly, there is an area where India can take the lead and it is in developing new digital models and leapfrog, and we have already seen that with 4G how India has made a huge leap, and must now try and replicate it with 5G.