The India Energy Hour Presented by 101Reporters Hard to Abate, Harder to Ignore: Decarbonizing India’s Heavy Industry | ft. Girish Sethi
Aug 21, 2025
Girish Sethi, Senior Director at The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI), shares his immense expertise in decarbonizing energy-intensive sectors like steel and cement. He discusses the critical transition from coal dependence, emphasizing the collaborative roles of finance, policy, and innovation in achieving climate goals. Sethi highlights the potential of green hydrogen and alternative fuels, contrasts India's progress with global standards, and explores challenges in adopting sustainable practices. His insights shed light on the intricate journey of India's heavy industry toward a net-zero future.
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Steel And Cement: Similar Scale, Different Structures
- India is the world’s second-largest producer of both cement and steel, with different industrial structures.
- Steel mixes large integrated mills, DRI units and scrap EAFs, concentrated in eastern India.
Coal Dominates Heavy Industry Fuels
- Apart from power, steel and cement are the next-largest coal users in India.
- Steel needs coking coal (mostly imported) while cement largely uses coal and petcoke with limited alternative fuel uptake.
Different Paths: Hydrogen For Steel, CCUS For Cement
- Hydrogen is promising for steel but not yet commercial at scale; costs and ore quality limit near-term rollout.
- Cement decarbonization relies more on lower clinker factors, alternative fuels, and ultimately CCUS rather than hydrogen.