Tech to decarbonise challenging sectors

A host of new technologies, robust government policy to back them, and green financing to securely tie-in everything into returns for investors is needed to decarbonise hard-to-abate sectors in India such as steel and cement, a panel of experts said at the Mint Sustainability Summit in New Delhi recently.

- Manas Pimpalkhare

The panel comprised steel industry veterans Sanjay Kumar Singh, former secretary in the steel ministry and currently the director of strategy and external relations, Jindal Steel; and Arvind Bodhankar, chief sustainability officer, Arcelor Mittal Nippon Steel India.

No single technology can be the "silver bullet" to decarbonise hard-to-abate sectors, said Bodhankar, adding that there are multiple solutions available. "You need to have a technology, you need to have a policy and you need financing. On the policy side, we are moving in the right direction," he said.