Climate Smart Cities

Project description
Title: Climate Smart Cities

Commissioned by: German Federal Ministry for the

Environment, Nature Conservation, and Nuclear Safety (BMU)

Country: India

Lead executing agency: Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs

(MoHUA)

Overall term: 2018 to 2022

Context
India is ranked sixth among the ten most affected countries in
the world as per the Global Climate Risk Index 2016, and
accounts for about seven per cent of the global Green House
Gas (GHG) emissions. It is therefore a crucial actor when it
comes to dealing with climate change related issues. 

Following the Paris Agreement in 2014, the Government of

India declared in their Intended Nationally Determined
Contribution (INDC) in 2015, that the country would take
steps to reduce its emission intensity by 33-35 per cent by 2030,
compared to the 2005 levels. However, this cannot be easily
achieved considering the size and growing population of India.
As per the Climate Action Tracker projection, the per capita
emission will increase from 2.1 tons of carbon dioxide
equivalent per capita (tCO2e/cap) in 2014 to 3.6 tCO2e/cap in
2030. This per capita consumption can be attributed, not only
to the changing consumption patterns of society, but also to the
growing urban population and its associated demands on urban
infrastructure, basic services and housing. The urban
population in India is projected to increase to 50 per cent of the
population in India is projected to increase to 50 per cent of the
total population by 2050.

In order to address the growing needs of the urban areas, the

Ministry of Housing & Urban Affairs (MoHUA), initiated the
Smart Cities Mission covering 100 cities. While this funding
scheme is reported in the INDC strategy for India through
supportive mitigation and adaptation measures, a clear climate
focus has not yet been realised. The Climate Smart Cities
project attempts to anchor climate-friendly solutions in the
Smart Cities Mission.

Objective
Climate-friendly solutions for urban infrastructure projects and
area-based development have been anchored in the planning
and implementation of projects.

Approach
In close cooperation, Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale
Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH and the Ministry of Housing
and Urban Affairs (MoHUA) develop methods to integrate
climate aspects into the Smart Cities Mission in a result-
oriented manner. In three partner cities, focused efforts in
selected fields of municipal services will be implemented and
monitored. These will be upscaled to other Smart Cities and
multiply the effects to achieve the climate goals by the
government.

The project works with the three Indian Smart Cities of

Bhubaneshwar, Coimbatore, Kochi and their respective state
governments of Odisha, Tamil Nadu and Kerala, in the
planning and implementation of smart and climate-friendly
measures for infrastructure and area-based development, as
well as the measuring and monitoring of their GHG emissions.
Th N i lI i f U b Aff i (NIUA) h h&
The National Institute of Urban Affairs (NIUA), the research &
training institute of the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs

and two German institutions; Technical University of Berlin

(TU Berlin) and Deutsches Institut für Urbanistik (DIFU), will
support the project in implementation as well as the wider
dissemination and upscaling of the experiences of the partner
cities across other smart cities through the innovative formats
of peer learning and knowledge exchange. The project is aimed
at the capacity development of 10 additional Urban Local
Bodies on climate relevant solutions. 

The project supports the Indo-German Working Group on

urbanisation and the international exchange of experiences on
urban climate strategies.

Results
The project leads the Climate Smart Cities Assessment
Framework in cooperation with MoHUA and NIUA which is a
monitoring tool for all 100 Smart Cities in the country with 30
indicators across 5 sectors. Through this framework, 100 Smart
Cities are enabled to assess their status of climate adaptation
and mitigation and target future projects and investments to the
indicators. A help desk and an online portal have been
established to guide and monitor the cities. An extensive actor
network of national and international funding and research
organisations is providing technical support to the Ministry and
GIZ. 

In three cities (Kochi, Coimbatore and Bhubaneshwar) projects

in the thematic areas of green buildings, urban green spaces and
storm water drains have been initiated through an urban design
thinking project in cooperation with TU Berlin. Additionally,
support is being provided to cities for the improved
management of Construction and demolition of waste and
management of Construction and demolition of waste and
solid waste. The projects will be upscaled to increase the
number of cities that implement integrated policies and plans
for more resource efficiency, mitigation and adaptation to
climate change as well as disaster resilience. MRV systems for
selected climate-relevant solutions are being developed to
document and evaluate the long term envisaged mitigation
impact of the measures.

The project disseminates German and international

experiences for including climate aspects into Smart City
projects through a networking platform and experience
exchanges in between Indian smart cities and training
institutes. Climate aspects in the urban sector thereby receive
more attention by decision makers.