Ongoing

Estimating sustainable clean fuel adoption policies in India

Research Team: Prabhat Barnwal, Farzana Afridi, Chrisma Dsouza Funded By: India Sustainable Growth Hub (ISGH) Description: This project examines how government programmes and subsidy designs influence households’ transition from firewood to cleaner cooking fuels such as LPG and electricity in India. By studying barriers to sustained adoption – including affordability and liquidity constraints – the project aims to identify effective policy strategies that can reduce indoor air pollution, improve health outcomes, and support environmental and climate goals.

Climate-responsive monetary policy: Integrating climate shocks into inflation modelling and forecasting

Research Team: Sunny Singh, Shovon Sengupta Funded By: India Sustainable Growth Hub (ISGH) Description: This study integrates climate shocks such as heatwaves, rainfall deficits, and floods into India’s inflation forecasting models to strengthen monetary policy responses. Using advanced econometric and machine-learning methods, it quantifies how climate events affect inflation and develops tools to help the Reserve Bank of India manage climate-driven economic risks.

Extending Data Collection of an RCT in Delhi Schools to Examine Cumulative and Persistent Effects of: ‘Technological and Behavioural Strategies to Mitigate the Effects of Air Pollution On Children’

Research Team: J. Cristobal Ruiz-Tagle, César Antonio Salazar Espinoza, Kanishka Kacker, Nikita Sangwan, Marcela Jaime Funded By: India Sustainable Growth Hub (ISGH) Description: This study evaluates how reducing classroom air pollution in Delhi’s schools affects children’s health and learning outcomes through air purifiers and behavioural interventions. By extending a previous RCT, it will measure cumulative and lasting effects of these treatments to understand their long-term impact on human capital development.

Incidence and impact of housing subsidies in urban slums

Research Team: Sabareesh Ramachandran Funded By: India Sustainable Growth Hub (ISGH) Description: This study evaluates the impact of India’s flagship housing grant programme on improving the living conditions of poor households and evaluates the programme’s downstream effects on resilience, health, and economic outcomes.

AI for additionality: Predicting deforestation risk to improve payments for ecosystem services in Meghalaya, India

Research Team: Rohini Pande, Lucy Page, Maike Pfeiffer Funded By: India Sustainable Growth Hub (ISGH) Description: This project investigates whether using machine learning to predict deforestation risk can improve the effectiveness of Payments for Ecosystem Services (PES) programs by targeting higher payments to high-risk areas. The research assesses the impact of risk-based PES targeting on conservation outcomes, household welfare, and climate resilience.

Impacts of the EU carbon border adjustment mechanism (CBAM) on India’s steel sector: Challenges, incentives, and pathways towards domestic carbon pricing

Research Team: Anjali Sharma, Johannes Gallé, Sreeja Jaiswal, Simon Bolz, Anandi Yadav Funded By: India Sustainable Growth Hub (ISGH) Description: This study examines how the E.U.’s Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) impacts India’s steel industry by imposing carbon costs on exports. It analyses the economic and environmental effects of this policy and explores strategies for India to balance trade competitiveness and sustainable industrial development.

Building Resilience: Can Public Works Investments Support Citizen-Centric Climate Resilience in Low-Income Settings?

Research Team: Charity Troyer Moore Funded By: India Sustainable Growth Hub (ISGH) Description: This study explores how India’s MGNREGS, a major rural workfare programme, can be leveraged to strengthen local climate resilience by aligning project selection and implementation with adaptation goals. Using remote sensing, administrative, and primary data, it will examine how current projects affect climate resilience and inform a future evaluation to test innovations that better support sustainable, climate-friendly infrastructure.

Incentivizing sustainable agricultural practices using satellite technology

Research Team: Naveen Kumar G, Nicholas Ryan, Steven Brownstone Funded By: India Sustainable Growth Hub (ISGH) Description: The project tests whether satellite-verified, performance-based incentives can increase adoption of water-efficient rice practices among smallholder farmers in Telangana and Karnataka, while reducing the high monitoring costs that limit small-farm carbon markets. It uses a randomised controlled trial with 400 farmers, creating virtual land consolidation for verification, and aims to help states shift from costly blanket subsidies to targeted environmental payments that protect groundwater and sustain farmer incomes.

Does subsidized insurance crowd out climate resilience? Experimental evidence from India

Research Team: Erin Kelly Funded By: India Sustainable Growth Hub (ISGH) Description: This study uses an RCT in West Bengal to identify whether the provision of subsidized agricultural insurance crowds in or crowds out the demand for climate-smart technologies, specifically flood-tolerant rice seeds. It separates the effects of insurance as a substitute (crowd-out) versus a means to lower risk associated with technology experimentation (crowd-in).

Fostering sustainable urbanisation: How urban policies affect the causes and consequences of climate change

Research Team: Paul Novosad, Sam Asher Funded By: India Sustainable Growth Hub (ISGH) Description: This project explores how political, regulatory, and spatial factors shape India’s transition to green energy and sustainable urban development amid rapid growth. By building an open data platform on cities, it aims to inform climate-resilient policies and equitable energy planning in one of the world’s most climate-critical economies.

Demanding green: European preferences, environmental legislation, and technological upgrading abroad

Research Team: Vaios Triantafyllou Funded By: India Sustainable Growth Hub Description: This study examines how E.U. supply-chain due diligence laws affect firms in India, focusing on green technology adoption, trade behaviour, and compliance costs. Using firm-level, trade, and satellite data, it will assess how these regulations influence environmental outcomes, market dynamics, and the distribution of costs between European and Indian firms.

Barriers and pathways to energy-efficient cooking in school meal programmes in India: Insights from Odisha and Maharashtra

Research Team: Clarence Martis, Shivani Gharge Funded By: India Sustainable Growth Hub (ISGH) Description: This study examines the continued reliance on polluting cooking fuels in school meal programmes, focusing on India’s Mid-Day Meal scheme across districts in Maharashtra and Odisha. It analyses how economic, geographic, institutional, and policy factors shape fuel choice, and assesses the implications for health, programme efficiency, and climate resilience.

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