CEPT University

It is postulated that the availability of amenities and city-specific locational advantages influence the location choices made by economic agents. We model productivity and availability of amenities, as exhibited by the presence of wage and rent differentials among Indian cities, as drivers of economic activity. Using person-level survey data pertaining to 27 class I cities (cities with a population of more than 100,000) in India, we construct the observed wage and rent differentials and classify the cities based on levels of productivity and amenities. In a federal structure of governance, where locational tournaments have an important bearing on local economic development and the export potential of a city, this exercise has important implications for the design of local public expenditure policy. JEL Codes: J200, J300, R100, R200

In the pursuit of sustainable and energy-efficient construction solutions, a comprehensive investigation into the thermal performance of 3D-printed concrete lattice walls was performed through a combination of experimental testing and CFD numerical modeling, aiming to uncover the underlying mechanism, direction and magnitude of heat flow affecting thermal transmittance. A calibrated numerical model accurately predicted their thermal performance, underscoring the reliability of the proposed model. Based on the model suggested heat-transfer mechanism, we expand the design space, aiming to uncover configurations that exhibit superior performance with insulation material. The results indicate lowest U value (0.79 W/m²K) of modified partially insulated lattice wall, surpassing the studied lattice configurations. This study offers a critical evaluation of lattice-wall design to develop thermally efficient cost-effective concrete wall, that align with the growing demand for lightweight, functional structures in built environment.

The rapid urbanization of Jaipur has profoundly altered its urban climate, driven by anthropogenic heat flux (AF) and shifts in surface energy dynamics. This study leverages remote sensing techniques, utilizing Landsat data, to quantify AF and assess its influence on the city’s climate. The findings reveal a striking paradox; despite a significant rise in AF from 127.31 W/m² in 1993 to 201.82 W/m² in 2020, Jaipur exhibits an anomalous urban cool island (UCI) effect during the daytime. In this phenomenon, surrounding fallow lands experience higher land surface temperatures (LSTs) than the urban core, defying the typical urban heat island (UHI) effect observed in most cities worldwide. This paradox is especially pronounced in semi-arid urban environments, where factors such as limited vegetation, arid conditions, and water scarcity intricately shape peculiar thermal behaviour. This study further highlights the role of urban expansion, with built-up areas growing from 11.95% in 1993 to 19% in 2020, intensifying AF. Notably, the latent heat flux was highest in vegetated areas, significantly reducing LSTs by facilitating evapotranspiration. Daytime surface temperatures have surged significantly, with temperatures ranging from 26–46.9 °C in 1993 to 31–56.5 °C in 2020, indicating an overall increase in surface heat intensity. Despite these increases, the UCI effect remains observable, further illustrating the cooling potential of urban vegetation. This study offers novel insights into the intricate dynamics of urban heat in semi-arid cities, providing refined perspectives on urban heat mitigation strategies and climate adaptation, with implications for future sustainable urban planning and environmental management.

The Integrated Command and Control Centre (IC3) has emerged as a key component of the Smart Cities Mission (SCM) in India. Although the mission has been widely critiqued, IC3s were used for communications, resource allocation and inter-departmental coordination in many cities during the COVID-19 pandemic. This study, based in the state of Kerala, uses in-depth interviews with personnel who were actively involved in the pandemic response, along with secondary data, to examine how the IC3 was used. The research finds that the vision of digital transformation and centralisation is reinterpreted by various layers of the state. The paper propounds the idea of the ‘entropic state’ to explain the situation where state agencies are able to act synergistically in an emergency, but default back to misalignment and internal competition once the crisis has passed. This article was published open access under a CC BY-NC-ND license: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ .

Lime plaster is a sustainable building material that can be an effective passive cooling strategy. The moisture buffering quality of lime causes adsorption and desorption of moisture which moderates the indoor relative humidity. Its vapour permeability is also influential in moisture transfer across the building envelope. Lime plaster also has a self-healing quality which prevents the formation of inner cracks. Moreover, its strength increases with time leading to a longer life span. In old structures, an important function is the breathability of ceilings and walls. Hence, it is often used in conservation projects where it improves the appearance and durability of old buildings. Often organic additives employed to impart certain qualities to the lime mortar/plaster led to mould growth. Mould growth degrades indoor air quality, and the occupant health is compromised. To avoid mould related problems, it is necessary to understand the behaviour of lime plaster with respect to the indoor relative humidity and surface moisture content. This paper focuses on the hygrothermal performance of lime plaster in naturally ventilated residential spaces. Surveys were carried out in 45 traditional buildings in Ahmedabad in India with measurements of ambient variables, such as temperature, relative humidity, wall moisture content, etc. The mould growth patterns of these spaces are related to the measured variables and wall characteristics. Hygrothermal simulations of some spaces were also carried out to observe the moisture buffering of lime plaster. Experimental observations were then compared to simulation results to see if the predictions of the hygrothermal models were realistic.

The global decline in air quality, attributed to pollutants from various sources such as fossil fuel usage, industrial expansion, and heightened commercial activities, underscores the importance of monitoring and forecasting air quality levels. This study delves into 3 years of daily particulate matter data spanning the pre-COVID (2019), COVID-era (2020), and post-COVID (2021) periods across thirty-seven monitoring stations in Delhi. Prior to analysis, the dataset underwent preprocessing to address missing and outlier values. Analysis of the dataset aimed to discern pollutant trends across stations and timeframes, identifying influential factors such as air temperature, surface pressure, and precipitation for modeling particulate matter concentrations. An Artificial Neural Network employing backpropagation was utilized for modeling. Training the model with 80% of the dataset, the remaining 20% served as the test dataset. Validation of the model's performance utilized standard statistical metrics including R2, r, root mean square error, and mean absolute error. Notably, the R2 for the training dataset were 0.82 and 0.84 and r for training dataset were 0.90 & 0.91 for PM 10 and PM 2.5, respectively. While the R2 for the test dataset were 0.78 and 0.79, r values for the test dataset stood at 0.88 for both PM 10 and PM 2.5. Furthermore, the model facilitated upscaling of observations to a spatial scale, broadening the scope of observations via simulations to enhance regional understanding.

This study investigates noise pollution in Sikar City, focusing on identifying sources, measuring health and environmental impacts, and proposing mitigation strategies. The objectives include analyzing noise pollution sources, assessing their effects on public health and the environment, and reviewing case studies to evaluate current policies and technologies. Data from Sikar City's noise monitoring stations were analyzed to identify significant pollution sources such as traffic, industrial activities, and construction work. Additionally, the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) method was used to determine optimal proposals for the city. A literature review of ten relevant studies provided insights into common noise pollution issues and effective mitigation strategies. The findings revealed that noise levels often exceeded national standards, necessitating targeted strategies for reduction. The proposed mitigation measures aim to support the Rajasthan Pollution Control Board and other stakeholders in enhancing regional environmental management.

This study investigates the application of 3D modelling to represent urban features in Indian cities, highlighting its potential in improving spatial understanding and data precision. With a focus on residential buildings, the research develops a robust framework for creating 3D models of varying levels of detail (LoDs) using CityGML as a standardized format. Utilizing tools such as ArcGIS Pro, Sketch Up, and FME, a LoD 3 model is successfully generated for a specific area, achieving a notable 91% accuracy upon validation. Practical applications are demonstrated through the evaluation of solar and rainwater harvesting potential within the modelled area, illustrating 3D models’ efficacy of in analysing real-world scenarios. This initial success suggests broader applications across entire cities d diverse building typologies, offering significant insights for urban planning and resource management in the Indian context.

Water pollution is a pressing global environmental issue with far-reaching consequences for the environment, public health, and economic development. Assessing and mitigating water pollution are critical for safeguarding environmental and public health. It involves identifying pollution sources, measuring impacts on health and the environment, and implementing reduction strategies. Sikar is one of the cities of Rajasthan facing a severe water pollution crisis, with significant contamination affecting surface and groundwater, highlighting the urgent need for sustainable water management practices. Additionally, Sikar is experiencing increasing groundwater levels due to excessive irrigation, inefficient water use, and limited recharge. This trend exacerbates water quality issues and poses risks to infrastructure and agriculture. This paper assesses the impact of current water pollution levels by measuring key water quality indicators (pH, BOD, COD, etc.) of Sikar City and comparing the indicators to national and international standards. It also addresses the issue of increasing groundwater levels due to factors such as excessive irrigation, inefficient water use, and limited recharge. The study then proposes mitigation strategies by reviewing relevant or similar case studies and research papers on water pollution in Sikar and similar regions.

Urban flooding poses a significant challenge to the rapidly growing Indian cities. Low-impact development strategies such as green roofs have shown the potential to reduce urban flooding. However, their performance assessment significantly varies across different studies. Therefore, the study’s primary objective is to evaluate green roofs in the Indian context. For this evaluation, the green roofs are assessed based on building-level implementation scenarios for a high-density urban area in India for 25%,50%, and 75% application rates and different rainfall intensities (2,3 and 4-h duration and 2,5,10 and 25-year frequencies). Secondly, to probe the variations in the green roof performance across studies, uncertainty contributions to the runoff reduction from different parameters are quantified. The results show that green roofs can reduce up to 62% of flood volume and 24% of runoff. However, they are reasonably effective only beyond 25% application rates. Further, rainfall intensity contributes the most to the uncertainty of runoff reduction from green roofs. This uncertainty assessment implies that localized evaluation of green roofs depending on local rainfall conditions is required for city-wide policy planning. The study has a significant contribution to building confidence in the ability of green roofs to reduce urban floods in the context of developing countries like India.

Climate change can have adverse effects on various ecosystems on the globe, with the cryosphere being affected to a significant extent. Of the cryosphere, mountain or alpine glaciers are essential resources for freshwater and various ecosystem services. Glacial ablation is the process of removal of snow and ice from a glacier, which includes melting, evaporation, and erosion. The increase in temperature on the Earth due to climate changes is causing rapid glacial abrasion. The rapid global decline in alpine glaciers makes it necessary to identify the key drivers responsible for a glacial retreat to understand the eventual modifications to the surroundings and the Earth's ecosystem. This study attempts to understand the influence of different driving factors leading to glacier retreat using Machine Learning (ML) and Remote Sensing (RS) techniques. Three models have been developed to estimate the glacial retreat: Feedforward Artificial Neural Network (ANN), Recurrent Neural Network (RNN) and Long-Short Term Memory (LSTM). The RNN performed the best with an average training and validation accuracy of 0.9. The overall shift of the area estimate has been identified over 10 years. The model thus generated can lead to a better understanding of the region and can provide a baseline for policy and mitigation strategies in the future.

Increasingly, researchers are finding and reporting on the critical role of daylight access in human health and well-being. However, the need for visual privacy, controlling direct sun and glare may cause occupants may have to curtail their daylight access from time to time. Existing research has shown that occupants exercise a large degree of control over their home’s energy use. This paper presents results from a field study of homes in Ahmedabad (hot and dry climate) to estimate the degree of control that occupants exercise on daylight levels in their homes. Eleven homes were monitored for a week for daylight levels received in the living room, use of electric lighting, and activities that have been carried out by occupants. Potential interventions (intentional and unintended) by the occupants, such as using curtains and blinds have been treated as occupant behavioral traits that may impede daylight access. The ideal daylight access of homes was estimated using computer simulation and then it was compared to observations in the field study to estimate the reduction in daylight access brought by the occupant(s). This study reveals the extent of trade-offs that occupants have to make for their daylight access and the occupant's comfort in their living rooms.

The case is based on Indore Municipal Corporation, a city government in Madhya Pradesh, India. It revolves around the challenges a city government navigated through to become the cleanest city in India in the cleanliness ranking (Swachh Sarvekshan). In 2014, the Indian government launched the Clean India Mission. The cleanliness of cities was assessed in this mission based on several metrics, and Indore was placed 25th in 2016 among 73 cities and has continued to rank first in the country in subsequent years. Waste management was a major problem for the city, and the key to waste management is waste segregation. In order to transform, Indore had to go for segregated waste collection from residential and commercial sectors. Waste segregation cannot happen without effective citizen engagement as it is the citizens who generate waste and if they collect it in a segregated manner at their end the disposal can also happen in a similar fashion. This requires mobilizing citizens towards a new habit. Mobilizing residents in a country and city with compounded diversity in literacy, education, culture, religious views and customs was a complicated undertaking that required significant investment and political resolve. Also, before involving the community, the system needs to be redesigned so that it aligns with the altered practice at the citizens’ end. Citizens need to believe that their efforts were manifesting into something fruitful for society. The Municipal Commissioner was in a dilemma as to what kind of engagement strategy would work. Would information, education and communication be enough, or it required something more and beyond. This case tries to demonstrate the specific challenges and impacts that such a campaign brings and the learnings it generates in terms of citizen engagement, institutional arrangements and mechanisms of governance to benefit most and importantly envisage how the change can be sustained for long.

Shared sanitation services continue to expand in India's growing cities, yet, these facilities are blighted by issues including lack of privacy, overflow of raw sewage, and notably, a lack of water supply. Access to water in shared toilets for menstruating women and girls to wash themselves, their reusable menstrual products, their stained clothes, and sanitation infrastructure is a critical but all too-often neglected aspect of menstrual hygiene management (MHM). Drawing on the existing literature and data from Maharashtra, this commentary article uses the example of urban India to highlight the ‘need of the hour’, the provision of water in shared sanitation facilities in the global South for MHM as and when required. Evidence-based water supply norms in shared sanitation for MHM, from menarche to the perimenopause, are key, to highlight the need for water as an ‘MHM plus’ requirement for women and girls reliant on shared facilities. Connecting shared toilets to piped water is a long-term process, but the provision of water in buckets is a start. Hygiene promotion can create awareness of the importance of water for sustainable MHM. Monitoring and evaluation can determine the impact of supplying water in shared toilets on MHM.