India is a country that boasts of diverse climate zones and an ever inflating population. In said situation, it comes as no surprise that the country finds it difficult to maintain a sustainable and efficient cold chain system. The cold chain includes refrigerated storage, transportation as well as distribution -all together playing a pivotal role in the preservation of food, pharma, vaccines and such other perishable goods. The only problem with this though is the very high costs associated with these cooling technologies. This has invariably led to problems in widespread adoption of the system and consequently, reduced penetration of the cold chain infrastructure in India .
The Inflated Costs and the Reasons Thereof
Since we are talking about inflated costs, we also need to shed some light on the reasons for the same, although some of them are quite obvious and common knowledge. Let’s take a look at the most important reasons:
● Expenses towards Energy Consumption
As is common knowledge, cooling systems like refrigeration make use of substantial energy for working properly. Considering the situation where In India, the costs of electricity are quite high, farmers and businesses alike, find it difficult to make substantial investments in the refrigerated storage facilities. It is understandable that for small scale enterprises, it can become difficult to contribute more into operation expenses for the maintenance of cold storage warehouses or transport vehicles.
● Capital Investment
If one were to establish an efficient and robust cold chain network system, one would have to make a significant capital investment towards it. The components of the cold chain like the cold storage facilities, the refrigerated trucks and of course the specialised set of equipment invariably involve quite high upfront costs. These costs understandable becomes difficult to bear for a number of stockholders in rural areas or even suburbs in some cases.
How Passive Cooling Can Save the Day
Passive cooling can be considered as a saviour approach in the high-cost scenario discussed above. While active refrigeration usually relies on mechanical systems, passive cooling uses natural processes as leverage for the temperature control process. Let’s discuss the ways in which passive cooling saves the day for the cold chain infrastructure in India.
● Cooling via Evaporation
This is one of the most efficient methods of passive cooling where, through water evaporation evaporative coolers can be used for maintaining low temperatures in the warehouses and such other storage spaces.
● Solar powered Ventilation
Solar power has, since long, remained a sustainable alternative to electricity. Following the same path, solar chimneys and vents can be used to enhance air circulation thereby cutting the electricity consumption and related costs to a great extent.
● Making Use of Thermal Mass
This is a more fundamental method of temperature regulation. It involves the construction of the buildings with thicker walls and by using materials having high thermal mass so that the temperatures can be regulated.
As we can see in all the above processes mentioned, passive cooling systems require very low to no energy and costs inputs. Their main capitals are the environmental conditions already existing, thereby reducing the reliance on electricity. So automatically, the cost involved can be reduced exponentially thereby ensuring better penetration of the cold chain system in India, even in its rural parts.
In fact, passive cooling also encourages community participation in a way. Building shaded storage spaces or usage of traditional cooling techniques can be considered as community initiatives which can prove to be quite cost-effective in the long run. These collaborative efforts can also enable the rural communities to create their very own cold chain solutions.
In Conclusion
So for the development of India’s Cold Chain infrastructure, balancing the efficiency and the costs involved is extremely important. Although it is never really possible to do away with active refrigeration, passive cooling has emerged with an undoubtedly sustainable path forward. With the help of natural resources and by encouraging community-driven solutions with incentivised adoption,India can successfully enhance its cold chain possibilities at the same time minimising the economical burden on the stakeholders.
