Last weekend, I was wandering in a swanky mall situated at South Delhi. Actually, it’s not one, but a cluster of three malls. There’s no clutter outside. The facade is majestic. Once inside, the cool ambience was a respite from the outer hot and sultry weather. There’s enough space for parking in the basement. The toilets are easy to locate and are clean, and the fittings in it are on the side of opulence. The mall owners and the architects have taken care to make the shopping experience comfortable. However, what the shopping complex lacks is the vision and services of a solar energy consultant and application of solar energy.
The majority of the crowd appeared to have come from the posh localities of South Delhi. I had no purpose other than walk in slow pace, and observe the brands and their interaction with the potential buyers. I could see the presence of almost all the brands in apparel and lifestyle categories, which one shopped on an overseas trip two decades ago. But I am not sure buying from these malls would carry the same snob value as shopping them in London. The stores are not only well lit but designed too—drawing power from the grid. The interesting bit was that the behaviours of the shoppers were similar in many respects as Paco Underhill has described of American shoppers in his best-selling books Why We Buy: The Science of Shopping and Call of the Mall.
The architecture and beneath it—the understanding of malls—have evolved in Delhi NCR in the past five years. The new malls are big in all aspects so that the exclusive stores have more space. There’s abundance of space for shoppers to move around comfortably without rubbing anyone’s shoulders. What remains invisible is the consumption of energy. The promoters and architects have adopted all aspects of malls as they exist in the developed countries. What they have missed out is in the use of solar energy.
It may sound utopian. But there are malls powered by solar energy. In Japan, the Aeon shopping mall near Yonago uses solar panels on its exterior to meet all its power requirements. The Oasis21 mall in Nagoya city has mini water pools on its roof, which control the environment in the shopping plaza and shopping center. Apart from saving energy, these innovative architectural designs help to reduce Japan’s carbon footprint.
Similar initiatives are taking place in the far away USA. At Jersey Gardens mall in New Jersey, which is about 1.3 million square foot in size, a single-roof solar system would soon be installed. The mall houses brands like Gap, H&M, Lord & Taylor Outlet, Neiman Marcus, Last Call, Nike and Saks Fifth Avenue. Thanks to solar energy consultants there, the mall’s roof would generate 4.8 MW of electricity, which is enough to offset 11 per cent of its electric consumption.
Why can’t our architects and developers think of solar, when we have so much benevolence of Sun?
The majority of the crowd appeared to have come from the posh localities of South Delhi. I had no purpose other than walk in slow pace, and observe the brands and their interaction with the potential buyers. I could see the presence of almost all the brands in apparel and lifestyle categories, which one shopped on an overseas trip two decades ago. But I am not sure buying from these malls would carry the same snob value as shopping them in London. The stores are not only well lit but designed too—drawing power from the grid. The interesting bit was that the behaviours of the shoppers were similar in many respects as Paco Underhill has described of American shoppers in his best-selling books Why We Buy: The Science of Shopping and Call of the Mall.
The architecture and beneath it—the understanding of malls—have evolved in Delhi NCR in the past five years. The new malls are big in all aspects so that the exclusive stores have more space. There’s abundance of space for shoppers to move around comfortably without rubbing anyone’s shoulders. What remains invisible is the consumption of energy. The promoters and architects have adopted all aspects of malls as they exist in the developed countries. What they have missed out is in the use of solar energy.
It may sound utopian. But there are malls powered by solar energy. In Japan, the Aeon shopping mall near Yonago uses solar panels on its exterior to meet all its power requirements. The Oasis21 mall in Nagoya city has mini water pools on its roof, which control the environment in the shopping plaza and shopping center. Apart from saving energy, these innovative architectural designs help to reduce Japan’s carbon footprint.
Similar initiatives are taking place in the far away USA. At Jersey Gardens mall in New Jersey, which is about 1.3 million square foot in size, a single-roof solar system would soon be installed. The mall houses brands like Gap, H&M, Lord & Taylor Outlet, Neiman Marcus, Last Call, Nike and Saks Fifth Avenue. Thanks to solar energy consultants there, the mall’s roof would generate 4.8 MW of electricity, which is enough to offset 11 per cent of its electric consumption.
Why can’t our architects and developers think of solar, when we have so much benevolence of Sun?
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