India must take immediate action because the vast majority of the buildings that will exist by the year 2040 have not yet been constructed. According to the authors of the newly released report, making smart design choices today will prevent the country from being stuck with inefficient structures that strain the power grid for decades.
The report states that “most of India’s 2040 building stock is yet to be built” and warns that immediate intervention is needed to avoid “locking-in inefficiencies for decades to come.”
Because India is growing so fast, it is adding a massive amount of new floor space every year, roughly equal to the entire existing building stock of a major state like Punjab. If these new homes and offices are not built to be energy-efficient from the start, they will waste electricity and put a huge burden on the power system for the next 40 or 50 years. It is much cheaper and easier to build things correctly the first time than to try and fix them later.
The report “Efficient Grid-Interactive Buildings in India: Status and opportunities” was published by the International Energy Agency in March 2026. Authored by Ksenia Petrichenko and Simrat Kaur, the study provides a strategic roadmap for India to integrate energy efficiency with smart digital technologies to support the nation’s clean energy transition.
