Johnson Controls Inc., which is involved in more than 500 renewable-energy projects worldwide, expects “exponential” growth in India’s low-carbon market as companies plan investments to cut energy costs.
Indian companies are planning on average to spend 12 percent of their budgets on energy-efficiency investments in the next year, Pramoda Karkal, managing director of Johnson Controls’s India unit, said today, citing an April survey conducted by the Milwaukee-based company.
“This is creating a market for such projects,” Karkal said by telephone from New Delhi. “It’s likely to grow at an absolutely exponential curve.”
Indian companies expect energy costs to rise 17 percent this year and are prioritizing such investments more than counterparts in nine other countries surveyed, including the U.S., Germany and China, the poll of 311 companies found.
India plans to start a market for trading energy-efficiency credits that is expected to grow to $16 billion in five years, Ajay Mathur, director-general of the Bureau of Energy Efficiency, said in an interview on Jan. 14. The number of energy-service companies in India, which audit consumption and help to reduce it, has more than doubled this year to 80, the bureau said last month.
