Akshay Makar: On a mission to get industries to use more renewables

Makar's Climatenza Solar provides low-cost, efficient solar thermal energy to industries with the aim to increase adoption

By Naandika Tripathi Forbes India Staff

Published: Feb 3, 2023 12:29:30 PM IST

Updated: Feb 3, 2023 12:50:56 PM IST

Full Bio

Akshay Makar
Image: Madhu Kapparath; light painting Kapil Kashyap Akshay Makar Image: Madhu Kapparath; light painting Kapil Kashyap

Akshay Makar | 29

Founder, Climatenza Solar

The world has seen an unprecedented growth of renewables in the past decade. However, this growth is limited to power generation, says Akshay Makar, founder of Climatenza Solar. According to the International Renewable Energy Agency, 75 percent of the energy in industries comes from the burning of fossil fuels.

Founded in 2018, Delhi-based Climatenza Solar develops and engineers concentrated solar thermal technology to generate energy for industrial applications. The thermal concentrators are designed to reflect sunlight onto a receiver where liquids get converted into steam that can either be stored or be converted into electricity. The goal is to increase renewable penetration among industries. The startup is working with multinationals to achieve their net-zero goals and have 23 MW capacity in pipeline with an opportunity to scale it to 273 MW in five years.

Climatenza will be investing $8.4 million for the development of India’s first state-of-the-art solar thermal production line for mass manufacturing. It plans to work with major industrial houses that are looking to scale renewable generation. With 273 MW, Climatenza will be able to offset 2.87 million tonnes of carbon emission, and earn revenue of over $38 million. Currently, 80 percent of its projects are in India, and the rest in Bangladesh.

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Within India, it is focusing on textiles, food processing and beverages, dairy, chemical and pharma. “Collectively, these industries use around 1.15 billion tonnes of fossil fuels. With an average cost of about $35 per tonne, the total addressable market is about $40.25 billion,” says Makar.

According to him, three things set his company apart: Space utilisation, technical efficiency and lower costs. “Our closest competition needs 100 sq m for installation while we need 5.5 sq m. We can be 35 to 40 percent cheaper compared to our competition due to the value chains being developed in India,” he adds.

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The firm recently signed a deal with Coca-Cola for deploying its technology at four of its plants in India, starting with Andhra Pradesh. It is also working with Rallis India, Tata Chemicals, Unilever, NCL and others.

“Climatenza Solar came in as our sustainability partner to reduce carbon footprint and provide energy security. We are working with it for demonstrating a 704 sq m pilot scale concentrated solar thermal plant and scaling this technology to achieve our carbon abatement targets,” says S Nagarajan, chief operating officer of Rallis India.