Publication: Improving Building-Level Thermal Comfort and Indoor Air Quality in South Asia: Energy-Efficient and Cost-Effective Interventions for a Changing Climate
Loading...
Other Files
82 downloads
Date
2023-06-12
ISSN
Published
2023-06-12
Author(s)
Editor(s)
Abstract
This report provides evidence-based guidance on cost-effective and energy-efficient cooling and ventilation interventions to improve building-level thermal comfort and indoor air quality for a changing climate in South Asia. It focuses on Bangladesh, India, and Pakistan but also covers all the countries in the region, including Afghanistan, Bhutan, Maldives, Nepal, and Sri Lanka. After an introduction, the report analyzes local climates and air quality issues, building types, and occupant behavior, as well as available passive and active interventions and their relevance in the region, before concluding with a set of recommendations for all building types. The report also identifies additional recommendations specific to residential and commercial buildings, along with policy and country-specific recommendations.
Link to Data Set
Citation
“World Bank. 2023. Improving Building-Level Thermal Comfort and Indoor Air Quality in South Asia: Energy-Efficient and Cost-Effective Interventions for a Changing Climate. © World Bank. http://hdl.handle.net/10986/39872 License: CC BY-NC 3.0 IGO.”
Associated URLs
Associated content
Other publications in this report series
Journal
Journal Volume
Journal Issue
Collections
Related items
Showing items related by metadata.
Publication Improving Indoor Air Quality for Poor Families : A Controlled Experiment in Bangladesh(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2007-12)The World Health Organization's 2004 Global and Regional Burden of Disease Report estimates that acute respiratory infections from indoor air pollution (pollution from burning wood, animal dung, and other bio-fuels) kill a million children annually in developing countries, inflicting a particularly heavy toll on poor families in South Asia and Africa. This paper reports on an experiment that studied the use of construction materials, space configurations, cooking locations, and household ventilation practices (use of doors and windows) as potentially-important determinants of indoor air pollution. Results from controlled experiments in Bangladesh are analyzed to test whether changes in these determinants can have significant effects on indoor air pollution. Analysis of the data shows, for example, that pollution from the cooking area diffuses into living spaces rapidly and completely. Furthermore, it is important to factor in the interaction between outdoor and indoor air pollution. Among fuels, seasonal conditions seem to affect the relative severity of pollution from wood, dung, and other biomass fuels. However, there is no ambiguity about their collective impact. All are far dirtier than clean fuels. The analysis concludes that if cooking with clean fuels is not possible, then building the kitchen with porous construction material and providing proper ventilation in cooking areas will yield a better indoor health environment.Publication India - Strengthening Institutions for Sustainable Growth : Country Environmental Analysis(Washington, DC, 2006-12-22)The objective of this Country Environmental Analysis was to help strengthen the environmental policy implementation framework, to meet the challenges of a rapidly growing and extraordinarily diverse economy in India. In particular, the study aimed at assisting with the implementation of the new National Environment Policy (NEP 2006), which was released in draft for public consultation at the time this study was initiated. This study focused on identifying and proposing ways to address major gaps in the existing institutional arrangements, as well as regulations and incentives for post-EM environmental compliance and performance. In view of the focus on the growth-environment nexus, the study covered three select sectors - industry, power (including three distinct sub-sectors: coal-based power generation, hydro power generation, and transmission), and highways - that are among the key drivers of growth. Together, these sectors represent a wide range of environmental impacts, sources and regulatory issues that allows drawing conclusions of broad relevance. The analytical framework used by this study was a combination of sector-wide reviews, based on secondary data of issues, policies, regulations and institutions, with several case studies of implementation experiences. Ranging across seven Indian States, the project-level case studies helped to gain a deeper understanding of barriers, as well as contributors, to better environmental compliance and performance in the real-life situation. The case studies involved primary data collection and consultations with local stakeholders. Selective reviews of international experience in environmental management were also conducted. The findings from all reviews and case studies have been integrated to leverage support for corrective actions building on a growing number of good practices in India and internationally. The key findings and recommendations of the study are grouped under five themes: (i) facilitating national dialogue and public participation; (ii) expanding the regulatory toolkit to enable environmental compliance; (iii) strengthening the capacity o f environmental agencies to meet the growing demands, (iv) aligning sectoral incentives with environmental priorities; and (v) working across sectors.Publication Pathways to Cleaner Household Cooking in Lao PDR : An Intervention Strategy(Washington, DC, 2013-05)The structure of this report reflects the directional organization of the study. Chapter two offers a detailed descriptive analysis of national- and regional-level household fuelwood use, supplemented by a detailed analysis of fuelwood consumption and expenditure among rural and peri-urban households. Chapter three discusses the health and gender-related issues linked to Indoor Air Pollution (IAP) exposure resulting from use of energy-inefficient cook stoves. A detailed analysis of potential exposure and risk factors is given as an example, using data from the case study. Chapter four analyzes household demand for cook stoves and the supply chain in the case study area, while chapter five presents the intervention strategy to promote improved cook stoves. Chapter six proposes a complementary pilot project for promoting the use of household biogas systems utilizing an alternative financing approach. Finally, chapter seven concludes.Publication Accelerating Energy Conservation in China's Provinces(World Bank, 2010-06-01)China's comprehensive 2006-10 energy conservation drive has succeeded in both delivering strong results to date and laying policy and program foundations for delivering more energy savings well into the future. The policies, program concepts, and implementation platforms created over the last four years will serve China well to achieve further energy conservation results during the next five-year planning cycle, and to help achieve China's target to reduce the carbon intensity of its economy by 40-45 percent by 2020. However, much work remains to be done, to improve, adjust, and strengthen the programs further, and to continue to interject new and creative solutions. This report seeks to provide provincial agencies and groups in China, and those that support them, with some outside perspectives and ideas on further development of provincial-level energy conservation programs over the next several years. The report also describes the provincial energy conservation programs developed during the last four years in some detail, since these programs are generally not well known outside of China. Primary focus is given to programs in the industrial sector. The industrial sector accounts for about three-quarters of China's energy consumption and is a priority for provincial governments Only several of the many important topics worthy of analysis could be considered in this first study; additional worthy topics may be analyzed in the future.Publication South Asia Development Update, October 2023(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2023-10-03)At just under 6 percent, South Asia is expected to grow faster than any other emerging market and developing economy (EMDE) region in 2024–25. However, for all countries, this will represent a slowdown from pre-pandemic averages. Several potential adverse events could derail this outlook, including risks related to fragile fiscal positions. Government debt in South Asia averaged 86 percent of GDP in 2022, above that of any other EMDE region. In some countries, outright defaults have short-circuited growth while, in others, increasing domestic borrowing by governments has driven up interest rates and diverted credit away from the private sector. Elections could add to spending pressures. An urgent policy priority for the region is, therefore, to manage and reduce fiscal risks. Over the longer term, the policy priority is to accelerate growth and job creation in a sustainable manner. The energy transition, away from fossil fuels toward sustainable sources of energy, presents an opportunity for the region to lift productivity, cut pollution, reduce its reliance on fuel imports, and create jobs. South Asia uses twice as much energy to produce each unit of output as the global average and the region lags in the adoption of advanced energy-efficient technologies. Even fiscally constrained governments can take action to support the energy transition with market-based regulations, information campaigns, broader access to finance, and reliable public power grids. With about 9 percent of the region’s workers employed in pollution-intensive activities, and these workers less educated and more often informally employed than the average worker, the energy transition will create challenging labor market shifts. This calls for measures to boost job creation and facilitate worker mobility, geographically and across sectors.
Users also downloaded
Showing related downloaded files
Publication Digital-in-Health(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2023-08-18)Technology and data are integral to daily life. As health systems face increasing demands to deliver new, more, better, and seamless services affordable to all people, data and technology are essential. With the potential and perils of innovations like artificial intelligence the future of health care is expected to be technology-embedded and data-linked. This shift involves expanding the focus from digitization of health data to integrating digital and health as one: Digital-in-Health. The World Bank’s report, Digital-in-Health: Unlocking the Value for Everyone, calls for a new digital-in-health approach where digital technology and data are infused into every aspect of health systems management and health service delivery for better health outcomes. The report proposes ten recommendations across three priority areas for governments to invest in: prioritize, connect and scale.Publication Unlocking Blue Carbon Development(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2023-09-11)The purpose of this paper is to provide a practical framework to guide governments in catalyzing and scaling up public and private investment in Blue Carbon as part of their blue economy development. It does this by describing in detail a Blue Carbon Readiness Framework, a step-by-step, well-illustrated guide with simple checklists. Client countries can use the illustrations and checklists to determine their readiness to catalyze and scale up investment in blue carbon credit finance. The Blue Carbon Readiness Framework consists of three pillars: 1. Data and Analytics; 2. Policy and Institutions; 3. Finance.Publication Classroom Assessment to Support Foundational Literacy(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2025-03-21)This document focuses primarily on how classroom assessment activities can measure students’ literacy skills as they progress along a learning trajectory towards reading fluently and with comprehension by the end of primary school grades. The document addresses considerations regarding the design and implementation of early grade reading classroom assessment, provides examples of assessment activities from a variety of countries and contexts, and discusses the importance of incorporating classroom assessment practices into teacher training and professional development opportunities for teachers. The structure of the document is as follows. The first section presents definitions and addresses basic questions on classroom assessment. Section 2 covers the intersection between assessment and early grade reading by discussing how learning assessment can measure early grade reading skills following the reading learning trajectory. Section 3 compares some of the most common early grade literacy assessment tools with respect to the early grade reading skills and developmental phases. Section 4 of the document addresses teacher training considerations in developing, scoring, and using early grade reading assessment. Additional issues in assessing reading skills in the classroom and using assessment results to improve teaching and learning are reviewed in section 5. Throughout the document, country cases are presented to demonstrate how assessment activities can be implemented in the classroom in different contexts.Publication World Bank Annual Report 2024(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-10-25)This annual report, which covers the period from July 1, 2023, to June 30, 2024, has been prepared by the Executive Directors of both the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) and the International Development Association (IDA)—collectively known as the World Bank—in accordance with the respective bylaws of the two institutions. Ajay Banga, President of the World Bank Group and Chairman of the Board of Executive Directors, has submitted this report, together with the accompanying administrative budgets and audited financial statements, to the Board of Governors.Publication At Your Service?: The Promise of Services-led Growth in Uzbekistan(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2025-01-07)In Uzbekistan, the services sector accounts for more than half of all jobs and has been central to the process of structural transformation over the past three decades. In the past decade, the growth of Uzbekistan’s services exports has lagged behind its manufactures' exports while FDI greenfield announcements to both sectors have been even. The growth of the services sector in the past five years was driven by social services, mostly reflecting increased public spending. This report groups the services sector into four categories based on their skill intensity, the extent of their linkages with other sectors, and their tradability in international markets: low-skilled consumer services, low-skilled enabling services , global innovator services. Of these groups, social services accounted for three-fourths of employment growth in the services sector between 2017–2022. These services also experienced relatively high rates of labor productivity growth, which was largely driven by higher public spending on wages and salaries.