Singapore announces ₹31,000-crore investment in Tamil Nadu

Simon Wong, High Commissioner of the Republic of Singapore, on Sunday announced plans to invest ₹31,000 crore in Tamil Nadu. Later, Professor Tai Lee Siang, head of Pillar, Architecture and Sustainable Design, Singapore University of Technology and Design, said creating a design for a ‘net-zero’ society requires an intention to design for it specifically and that increasingly ‘green’ cities or net-zero cities are built on the foundation of a ‘business-as-usual’ approach. Delivering the keynote address on creating a framework for India’s first net-zero industrial park, Professor Siang said, “The design for a net-zero world means there should be an intentional effort to design for it, but since 2016, we are not seeing sufficient design implementation leading to a measurable outcome. More importantly, it is about tackling ‘business as usual’ because that’s the part that actually gives us a lot of problems.” He added that responsible industrial park developers, city developers, and district developers must look at ‘solarisation’. Professor Siang added that a ‘net-zero’ industrial park must start with scope 1, which is a green master plan, populated with green buildings that tackle ‘business-as-usual’ approach; scope 2, which is to ensure ‘over’-provision of renewable energy at district and building levels; and scope 3, which is to increase the network effect of a green district to mitigate logistics and supply chain carbon emissions.