Extreme conditions place immense pressure on the extant infrastructure responsible for managing water waste, solid waste, healthcare, transport, and traffic congestion.

As cities grow, they are exposed to various forms of climate hazards in the form of extreme heat, floods and droughts, making people, communities and infrastructure vulnerable to anthropogenic climate change. 

In its first formalised attempt to combat this vulnerability by assessing climate risks, Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation (AMC), with the help of Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) and ICLEI-Local Governments for Sustainability, has prepared a Climate Resilient City Action Plan – Towards a Net Zero Future which they are calling CRCAP.

This plan will “enable city officials to formulate, institutionalise, implement, and continuously update climate resilience strategies and GHG emissions reduction measures”.

The plan focuses on key objectives of reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, enhancing urban adaptive capacities, planning for climate resilient infrastructure, and promoting circularity and resource efficiency. 

Climate Vulnerability, Resilience 

A 2024 report on Climate Resilient Cities by World Resource Institute posits that ‘exposure to climate hazards may or may not be uniform across a city or urban area, but how these hazards are experienced by people is almost always uneven, dynamic, and contextual.’

Climate resilience refers to a system’s ability to withstand and adapt to climate change impacts and to reduce GHG emissions. The methodology includes assessing vulnerabilities, enhancing absorption capacity, promoting sustainable practices, and engaging stakeholders. 

The vulnerability of systems to underperform and failure to fully deliver, calls for measures both mitigatory and adaptive, from an equity lens. Cities such as Ahmedabad are sites of inequality which translates into differentiated exposure to the same effects of climate change. This is called differential vulnerability. 

The report rightly points out that “vulnerability assessments can help capture the often highly differential forms of climate vulnerability present in cities to support effective and just climate action and resilience plans. This can be achieved by considering how socioeconomic, political, institutional, and cultural factors influence the sensitivity of urban dwellers to climate threats and their adaptive capacity in the face of those threats”. 

For Ahmedabad’s CRCAP, the city's risks and vulnerabilities to climate hazards and air pollution were analysed to guide climate-sensitive urban planning and resilience policies. 

Gaps In Urban Systems

Sejal Patel, professor at CEPT University, said, "There are three major areas that need to be kept in mind while making city-resilient plans. Firstly, institutional capacity, assets required, and their operation, so that the lifecycle benefits are achieved. Secondly, having a clearly-defined legislative framework to demarcate what public stakeholders on one hand, and private owners and households on the other, will have to do. Thirdly, securing finance.”

Speaking to The Secretariat, she added, “This is an opportunity to fill out the gaps, and what I see is missing is an integrated approach is missing."

Approximately 4.3 per cent of Ahmedabad’s total area suffers from water logging, affecting 9 per cent of the population; total baseline GHG emissions for 2021- 22 amount to 15.1 million tonnes of CO2e (carbon dioxide equivalent); urban flooding has been marring the wastewater drainages and management.

Manufacturing Industry and Construction account for 33 per cent of energy consumption and 45 per cent of GHG emissions, followed by the residential sector accounting for 24 per cent of energy consumption and 24 per cent of GHG emissions.

Without additional efforts, Ahmedabad’s GHG emissions are expected to increase nearly seven-fold to 99.5 million tCO2e by 2070, up from 15.1 million tCO2e in 2021-22. The projected 2050 water demand is expected to be more than 1.5 times the demand in 2021. 

About 90 per cent of Ahmedabad’s total water supply is made available through bulk water purchases from Narmada Canal. The 122 lakes in Ahmedabad are not harnessed for drinking water due to their degraded water quality, inflow of sediments from the catchment area, discharge of untreated or partially treated domestic wastewater, industrial wastewater disposal, and solid waste disposal. 

Ground water table levels in Ahmedabad vary from 1 m to 24 m. As water demand is increasing in newly developing areas, water tanker supply businesses that rely on groundwater extraction have emerged in the northwest, west, and north zones. As per a recent study by the Institute of Seismology Research (ISR), Ahmedabad is sinking by 12 mm to 25 mm per year due to ground water withdrawal from subsurface levels, especially in its western part including the Ghuma and Bopal areas.

10,897 properties in the city have rainwater harvesting infrastructure but the actual rainwater harvesting potential of such structures is not known. A 2010 report by the Central Ground Water Board said that high concentrations of iron, fluoride, chloride, and nitrates are present in the city’s groundwater.

The current daily water supply model in the city involves an intermediate supply for 2.5 hours (2 in the morning and 0.5 in the evening). Households collect and store as much water as possible during the limited supply period, keeping taps turned fully open throughout this period, and use the stored water over 24 hours. Total non-revenue water (NRW) in the city amounts to 25 per cent of total water supply, providing 170 litres per capita per day (lpcd) of water supply, as against the recommended 135 lpcd as per the Service Level Benchmark (SLB). 

Ahmedabad is expected to continue its urban growth; this implies an increase in demand for urban services and infrastructure. The city’s population has grown to 7.18 million (2021) persons from 5.58 million in 2011. Population projections estimates that Ahmedabad’s population will reach 9.2 million by 2030, 13.4 million by 2050, and 15.3 million by 2070, which is more than double the current population. 

Patel said, “A cultural shift is necessary to change public apathy towards their own lifestyles. The entire ecosystem needs to be worked upon. It takes time. There needs to be a change in consumer behaviour as well. Even to recycle water, all the people in the value chain need to be addressed. An ecosystem-based approach is the only way forward."

The CEPT University professor added, "Unfortunately, tools for conserving additional resources like rainwater harvesting, which is conditionally mandated in the CGDCR, are rarely implemented because users show no interest. The harvesting mechanism and dual plumbing lines don’t work from Day One, as people don’t want to re-use greywater. The solar rooftop has picked up because it directly impacts their bills. People will take harvesting seriously only if we put a price on water. Until then, no matter how many mechanisms get installed, their lifecycle benefits won't be utilised. Consumer interest-based solutions have proven to work better."

Strategies To Tackle Climate Vulnerabilities

“A resilient city doesn’t focus on one aspect. Various stressors need to be addressed. When we’re trying to build up capacity to deal with what the future would entail," noted Shrutika Parihar, PhD, Ahmedabad University.

Ahmedabad’s CRCAP aims to make the city climate-resilient and achieve Net Zero GHG emissions by 2070. The plan focuses on reducing GHG emissions by promoting energy efficiency, increasing RE use, adopting sustainable waste management practices, and encouraging low-carbon transport options. 

The CRCAP identifies two scenarios for GHG emissions reduction: the ‘Progressive Action’ scenario and the ‘Net Zero Pathway’ scenario. The Progressive Action scenario represents increased levels of climate action at the city scale compared to the status quo. The Net Zero Pathway scenario is based on India’s commitment to achieve net zero emissions by 2070 and builds upon targets set by the national and state governments.

The third scenario, the Business-as-Usual (BAU) Projection, serves as a reference point for assessing the impact of emission reduction scenarios. It represents the level of GHG emissions that would occur unless additional efforts were made beyond the current measures in place. According to the BAU Projection, Ahmedabad’s GHG emissions are projected to increase nearly seven-fold by 2070.

This means that if the cities go on being managed as they are, we have very little to be hopeful about when it comes to adapting against climate vulnerability.

(This is the first installment of a three-part series exploring Ahmedabad's approach to air quality, water management and urban greening. The upcoming articles will dive into the city's AQI, the provisions outlined in the CRCAP, and give actionable recommendations)