Technologies that involve the use of high-GWP refrigerants or components that are not energy efficient which lead to global warming and climate change have to be replaced with sustainable technologies. The technology profile of the cooling sector necessitates changes as the current technology in use is environmentally unsustainable, and their applications are limited. Hence, the transition to sustainable technologies and identification of relevant applications across sectors needs R&D, product development, and innovation. More importantly, it has to be underscored that the success of such endeavours would critically depend on how well different actors in cooling collaborate with each other.

Since India’s cooling sector requires a thriving R&D ecosystem, we engaged in a research to ascertain how this may be encouraged through the introduction of institutional reforms in existing innovation programmes dedicated to cooling. We started by examining some of the key public–private R&D collaborations that have led to successful outcomes and determined the underlying factors of success. These factors were then analysed in the form of the best practices that collaborative innovative programmes follow across many different areas such as policy vision, financing, intellectual property negotiations, intensity of collaboration and deployment strategies in order to increase chances of success, operational efficiency, etc. These institutional lessons were further contextualised and an initial set of recommendations were prepared for programmes in general. In other words, a summary of best practices and ways of operationalising them was offered by way of these recommendations.

Through the implementation of the best institutional practices in research programmes, we believe that the overall R&D and technology outcomes will become better. This will help us arrive at the goal of clean and sustainable technologies faster. These smaller goals are subservient to our larger goal to make the country a net-zero carbon emitter, which is indeed closely linked to reducing the carbon footprint of cooling applications. It is only going to be possible through the realisation of technology transitions in different end-use applications.

In terms of expanding the conversation around this topic, a fair bit of analysis is still required to be done to fix the incentive structure for different research actors to innovate in the country. There are more insights to be gained about how research in academia can be aligned and shaped in response to the industrial realities and priorities, not just in terms of a programme, but as engendering of a collaborative innovation ecosystem. In addition, a deeper investigation of the institutional mechanisms, and set-ups that support technology development in the country have to be undertaken to streamline the processes they follow. There may also be a need to assess the institutions for promotion of technology development in terms of upgrading their funding, capacity and outreach, and building new specific functions within them.

Going forward, questions related to cooling supply chains in India and the issues that import dependent supply chains pose to cooling R&D and adoption of new technologies will be examined. It will be a befitting complement to the attempts made by the Government of India to give a fillip to manufacturing in the white goods sector through a Production Linked Incentives (PLI) scheme. Further linkages between public research labs and industrial research will also be highlighted as part of the ongoing work on collaborative R&D.

As a final word, the success of the proposed recommendations will depend on the zeal and commitment with which they are implemented. Articulating the changes as the first step must be followed by a long process of canvassing with concerned authorities to discuss these changes and modulate them as per the specific context and identified opportunities and limitations.