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ENERGY AUDIT:

SHOPPING MALLS v/s OPEN MARKETS

Kangkan Boro

Sehaj Singh Kalra

Naman Kawatra

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Introduction

Our project focuses on the comparison between Open Markets and Shopping Malls. The main criterion was energy consumption. It tries to find out which is better on the basis of following broad factors:

1. Consumption of resources

2. Generation of waste material

3. Customer Satisfaction

4. Social Acceptance

5. Economic Feasibility

India is growing fast and enjoying international prestige as many foreign companies are expanding their presence. Traditional shops are turning into departmental stores, supermarkets and specialty stores. Over the last few years, retail has become one of the fastest growing sectors in the Indian economy.

In the last decade Delhi and NCR region has witnessed an exponential increase in number of Shopping Malls. People are relating it to the development of country, but are it really true? Everything has its share of pros and cons.

In countries like USA and Europe Shopping Malls have already replaced traditional markets . But those countries have already developed and are no longer in a position to change this, IF Required. But India is in developing stage, so the decisions made now are crucial and will decide the fate of our country in future.

Our project tries to answer these questions in a hope to find out an optimal solution that is socially, economically as well as politically feasible.

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Background Information

“The Liberalization of trade in India in 1990's brought the people of India the similar status as that of a US consumer and since then Consumer market has never looked back. The most prominent result of this has been the rapid rise of malls in metropolis areas in 21st century.”[1]

But the impact of such kind of increase in “mall culture”[2] means a negative impact on environment. Delhi currently boasts of 28 malls and about 17 more will come up in following year. This “mall boom” has effected construction which had recorded increase of 10% and this has also led to rise of 12% of total electricity requirement. [3],[4] Malls are gearing up to reach small towns too, the question that we need to ask is how efficient they are when compared to the traditional shops and complexes. Also are they as much eco-friendly as they are consumer friendly or are they just another luxury to scar the face of our beautiful planet 'Mother Earth'. We will like to take up aspects involved in coming up of malls and their impact on economy environment and our daily lives.

Although malls have been on rise but they have faced their share of criticism too. One of this is that currently, the Indian retail market lacks designated mall management firms. Large real estate developers and retail chains either have their own mall management arms operating as subsidiaries or have contractual agreements with international property consultants. Till recently, mall management was limited to facility management by a majority of developers in India, leading to gaps in mall management practices. Given the high future supply of malls and increasing competitiveness within the Indian retail market, developers must correctly address these gaps to ensure success.

A sense of concern was expressed over the following challenges to the Indian retail market:

lack of quality locations

shortage of trained staff

rising rental values

mall management

The first three concerns can be classified as external factors, whereas mall management is internal. External factors are common to all players in the Indian retail industry, whereas mall management is specific to individual malls. The success of Indian malls will not only be achieved by housing the biggest and the best mix of retailers, but also by setting up new standards and procedures in mall management that will provide a platform to differentiate its products and services from competitors.

Globally, mall management broadly includes:

positioning a mall

zoning – formulating the right tenant mix and its

placement in a mall

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promotions and marketing

facility management – infrastructure, traffic and

ambience management[5]

Secondly malls could be regarded as the most hungry institution in terms of energy among the service sector structures. Here are some statistics to support the statement:

The overall constructed area to increment by about 5 times from 21 billion square feet (2005) to approximately 104 billion square feet by 2030 at a CAGR between 5% to

10%. Building energy consumption accounts for over 30 percent of electrical energy

consumption in the country, and is rising annually at 8 % . Lack of energy conscious designs lead to rampant inefficiencies in commercial

buildings . Energy Audits show energy saving potential of up to 30-50% .Energy performance index (EPI) 200 to 300 kWh/sq m/year . [4]

Malls have been known to be causing pollution too.

Traffic and Parking Pollution. Shopping malls are usually accessed by cars and thus they generate a dense traffic during the operation hours. Not only that traffic increases substantially in the vicinity of malls, but cars are usually driven at slow speeds when most of the toxic exhaust is generated. Although, the exhaust gases will get into the atmosphere and thus dilute, studies have shown that within the mall and its vicinity air quality is be affected. Additionally, the noise pollution may also be a factor for nearby residences. A parking lot needs fairly large space, around 25 square meters (270 sq ft) times the number of places. This means that parking lots usually need more land area than for corresponding buildings for offices or shops if most employees and visitors arrive by car.

Plastic Waste Pollution. A study from India identified the plastic bags that usually pile up in and around malls may be a major cause of pollution. This pollution generally comes from the restaurant and similar types of shops.[6]

` Despite all this problem malls have overpowered open market complex in terms of sense of luxury and quality that they provide. Now hardly any developers are taking up open market projects. Everyone have their hearts set on building more malls.

Hence The Force by which malls are rising is to be reckoned and realizing this, the idea is to minimize the cost of running a mall or even a shopping complex for that matter to ensure that the damage done to environment is minimizes and we carry on the development

sustainably. Thus some of measures that are expected by government to take up in their policy are :

Green rating systems for buildings that will save energy and diminish pollution;

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Better management of wastes (especially plastic waste) involving proper collection and disposal;

More efficient lighting system;

Replacement of plastic bags with paper bags or fibre-based bags[7],[8]

These measures and solutions will be further discussed elaborately in a later section of this report where we will try to come at a solution as to how we can make our Indian markets especially Shopping Malls energy efficient and eco-friendly.

At last I would like to conclude in the words of Mr. Pachauri:

“Energy-efficient buildings are, perhaps, even more necessary than energy-efficient cars — you can change your car but you can't throw away houses.”

-R K Pachauri (July, 2005)

People interviewed and surveyed

Mall Architect

Mr. Rahul Mishra - Architect Of JMD Mall

Since architect is like a mother for mall in it's development stage with thought it would be appropriate to get his views on getting to know about the impact of malls on us socially, geographically, and health-wise.

Maintenance head of Mall

SP Roy, AGM, DLF India

Maintenance Head( In charge of both maintenance and architecture) of Open Market : Sreenadh Tripathi :DGM - DLF Galleria

To get an Idea as to how the energy is distributed and also how the waste is treated we sought to interview the maintenance head of respective mall and open market and later on compare the two to get conclusion on the area of Eco-friendliness.

Developer of a mall :

Vidyadharan DLF India (City centre mall)

To Understand the strategy of developer in going for mall rather than open market and to know if he really feels good about malls or it was for financial reason that he opt for the former was necessary to make a conclusion. Thus this interview was made.

Government Official :

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MrGulati(including his contacts which he used to answer the questions):

MCD Department

Under this category we planned to include different government officials to have knowledge under various departments though we were not fully successful in gaining all accesses we wanted as explained later.

We chose government official(s) to interview because:

We wanted to gain knowledge about various rules and their implementations on commercial lands like malls/open markets.

To know about the detailed specifications placed on architecture of such places.

To know about the rate at which they use facilities like electricity, water etc.

To gain access to government data to have knowledge about levels of pollution and electricity consumption.

To know about the restrictions of different sorts imposed on malls/open markets.

To have better knowledge about real life scenario about the extent to which rules and regulations are actually implemented.

To see what is the procedure that various Government departments follow like what data and other things they maintain in order to have better knowledge of the procedure followed.

To see if there are any loopholes in the rules or their implementation and to find a better way, if possible.

To know the differences of rules / facilities provided by government between open markets and malls.

I asked the related questions under government official category from Mr.Gulati, who is in MCD department. He used his contacts from other government departments also to provide me the related data and answers. We actually wanted more descriptive data in order to have better analysis but unfortunately the official government data we got was limited. The reason and corresponding shortcomings are explained in detail in subsequent section.

Mall Manager

Mr Katyadi

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Earlier Maintenance Secretary (5 Years), Manager since 4-5 months

DLF City Centre

Mall Manager was an important person to be interviewed. We had data and corresponding information from sources other than mall manager. We could analyse it.Though we gained some data from mall manager as well but the main reason was thatwe wanted to have opinion of an expert like mall manager who could figuratively tell the role of malls in present society and its corresponding relation with Indian society and its modernisation.

We chose mall manager to interview because:

We wanted to have his view on the reason for exponential rise in number of malls in Delhi in the past decade.

To know about the corresponding relation between development and number of malls.

To know about the position and status that malls hold in our society.

To have his view on open markets and difference between malls and open markets on basis of ecological preservation.

To have data regarding distribution of different types of shops, especially trade-off between branded v/s non-branded shops.

To know about distribution of electricity and other sources among different shops present in malls.

To know about measures being taken for ecological preservation and promotion of renewable resources.

To know what position he holds as a manager when it comes to implementation of new rules and efforts for greener future.

To know the influence of board members on him, his decisions and overall operation of malls.

Survey Data

Customers

The people surveyed were generally between ages 18-30.

A relatively young crowd was chosen as most of the mall-goers nowadays are these young people.

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Most of the malls and new markets target the young generation as they form the majority group among their customers.

60% of the people were surveyed online as we thought social networking sites (like Facebook and Google) are one of the best platforms to reach out to the young people. People in the age group 18-30 are socially very active and hence these social forums provide an excellent platform for productive discussions.

The field survey was conducted in and around the Priya Marketing Complex. The DLF Promenade and the DLF Emporio Shopping Malls being near it, it was a perfect place where many shoppers come daily. Moreover, it was a convenient place for us to conduct the field survey as it is much closer to our campus.

The field survey too involved many young people .

Shopkeepers

Around half of the shopkeepers surveyed were from the Priya Marketing Complex and the other half from malls in the Saket area (Select City Walk and DLF Malls).

Almost equal number of people were chosen from each group as it was realised that certain responses might be biased .

Restaurants and food stalls were not included in this field survey as malls have mostly franchise-based fast food restaurants (like KFC,McDonald’s,Domino’s etc.) , while restaurants in open markets are generally the traditional ones. Although Priya Market did have some fast food joints , we thought comparison between these two classes of restaurants wouldn’t be proper.

Moreover, these fast food joints are generally filled most of the time and so the staff working there has their hands full.

The shops (shopkeepers) selected for the survey were carefully chosen so as to include every category of shops (except food stalls) in both Priya Market and the Saket Malls.

Apparel Shops were given special interest as they are one of the most important categories of shops in both open markets and shopping malls. It is the section of shops that interests the highest number of people.

Personal Experience and Difficulties faced during Interviews

I, had a very nice experience in interviewing people and everyone of them (Architect, Maintenance head and Developer)were very eager to share their knowledge with me. The only problem that I may have faced was maybe the unavailability of time with some of

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interviewees with whom I had to take interview on phone which was different kind of experience in it's own.

Otherwise each my questions were answered very politely.

Government Official :

MrGulati is a nice person and showed full co-operative. I actually have my aunt in Ministry of Home Affairs in Delhi branch. I took her help to find the person to be interviewed. We actually planned to interview people under different departments including Energy Bureau, MCD Department and Electricity Board. But we were not able to do so. One of the reasons was lack of proper communication between Home Affairs department and energy bureau. I was strange to find this. I mean if different departments do not interact properly, how we can expect proper functioning of government?

The MCD person could be easily accessed through my aunt’s help. The electricity board person was also accessible but they refused to give exact data regarding electricity consumption and bills. I thought of using my aunt’s power to get the data but I felt that it would not be the right thing to do, so we couldn’t count on that.

Mr Gulati from MCD department was fully co-operative. He even called a person in energy bureau to help me and gain some of the knowledge. But I felt that because of the position in which he is in department, he did not truly give the answers to one or two questions where inefficiency of implementation of rules by their department was seen. He also avoided one of thesekinds of question and I had no way to convince him to answer!

Rest went fine with interview with him.

Mall Manager :

Mr Katyadi, Mall Manager, DLF city centre showed full co-operation. I was able to contact him using my sister’s contacts. She was somehow able to get contact of one of the person in maintenance department of mall. Using him, I climbed the ladder, he giving his boss’s number, his boss giving his own boss’s number, which finally was mall manager.

I felt people in private sector are far more co-operative, lending their help compared to people in government departments. Communication is also easy with these people. He told his views on role and position of malls in our society these days.

There was one observable thing – though the mall people were doing recycling of water, they were not more worried about switching to greener ways by compromising on some things. He was more concerned with sales figures, as explained later in subsequent section.

Analysis:

Interview analysis

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My analysis would be that In a bid to reach high level of lifestyle we have created a “mall cultre” as told by Mr. TRIPATHI THE COORDINATOR OF DLF open marketplace which promises a better place for us but in reality as most of people I interview agrees that they are ultimately not very healthy for clean living. But then I also came to know that they and government is aware of these and they have been following measures laid by government in order to create a green marketplace. But the case of reviving Open Markets was not really fancied by anyone. Thus this was in agreement in background data where it was concluded that malls have really over taken open market to a point of no return.

Although this may seem bad but this is not really the case as when I asked Mr. Vidyadharan the developer of city centre Gurgaon about the measures taken for green rating he said, “Well as i said before at time of development of mall there were no norms But since 2006 we have a certain rules by government. These include:

1. Minimize Glass surface to reduce heat trap.

2. Use of Double paneled with vacuum in between to stop heat.

3. Making structure that relies on daylight and not entirely on external lightning

4. Use of Filters in Chimneys to settle heavy particles.

5.Solar panel installation for minimum 15% of lights.

Also before mall is opened it need Clearance from Environmental Impact Assessment Authority.”

This really made me believe that we can make malls sustainable for environment and enjoy the luxury that they provide.

Government Official :

Following important observations were made:

There is a proper procedure to be followed before passing the architecture of the commercial property like malls/open markets.Delhi Urban Art Commission (DUAC) plays a major role in this.

NOC’s are to be taken from different departments while construction of building. This also includes checking before the construction of building begins, as well as after the construction of building ends.

Whole plan is decentralised. It is the duty of respective Government departments to check whether the rules are being followed or not.

100% area covering is allowed for such buildings opposed to 70-75% for residential area.

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Nowadays, it is necessary for commercial zone to facilitate parking and also to ensure that it is earthquake resistant.

Energy Conservation Building Code (ECBC) was launched in May, 2007, which addresses the design of new commercial buildings. This basically focuses to optimize the building’s energy demands.

No subsidies are provided by government to any commercial operations like malls/open markets. Rather they have to pay a higher price for usage of sources as compared to that paid by residential area. E.g. - the cost of per unit electricity is Rs.2.5 in non-commercial buildings, but all commercial activities get it at around Rs.7 per unit.

The above observations tell us the important concept of ECBC, introduced by “Bureau of Energy Efficiency”. Since this has been introduced recently, it’s effect and the extent is not clear yet and nothing can be said determinately. But according to us, this could be a big step for ecological preservation. Presently it is optional for buildings to come and apply for ratings. The cost fee is greater than Rs.1, 00,000. Rating is done on scale of 1-5, 5 star labelled buildings being the most efficient. This has not yet started for retail malls but will be implemented in near future.

We propose a further modification in this. Government can make the cost of per unit electricity inversely proportional to the rating of the building. This will make malls and open markets more efficient on energy basis since they will try to be as efficient as possible in order to have less cost per unit of electricity.

Other rules are being implemented. Especially the Disaster Management department is playing a great role by carrying drills at regular interval. New parking related rules are also very efficient.

Mall Manager :

Following important observations were made:

. On an average, a shop in a mall covers around 2,000 sq. foot.

. The minimum electricity bill per shop is Rs.3, 000.

“Escalators, hallway AC’s etc. are common to all shops. Also the cleaning of floors, maintenance of toilets etc. All such costs come under maintenance charges. The maintenance charge is around Rs.25, 000 – 30,000 per shop.” Said Mr Katyadi, the manager.

Recycling of waste water generated by the mall is going on using a plant that is installed in the mall.

According to manager rise in number of malls is a symbol of development.

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Manager himself agrees that prices of goods in malls are higher as compared to outside.

Manager also agrees that people come to malls not only for shopping but also for recreation.

“Developing malls in or near slums is not at all feasible.” Says manager, thus indicating that such development is not feasible in a city of slums.

The above observations agree with the data of survey conducted on customers that people not only come for shopping but more because of recreation. It also agrees with the result of survey that prices of goods in malls are higher.

From above points it is clear that high maintenance charge is imposed on shops, for facilities like escalators and hallway A.C’s, resulting in hike of price of goods. This indicates that comfort does come with fancy facilities like escalators but simultaneously at a high cost. This is not the case in open markets since there are no hallway A.C’s and escalators there.

Thus there is a scope of certain optimisations that can be used in malls to cope up with high energy consumption.

Survey Analysis

Analysis of Customer Survey Data:

According to the survey, a majority of the people (83%) believe that the products in Shopping Malls are of high quality. This agrees with the common belief that Shopping Malls do have quality products. One of the main reasons for this can be that Shopping Malls mostly have shops with big brand names. The quality of products of these brands are generally unquestioned and are believed to be good. Also, the survey shows that the same cannot be said for open markets. There is a relative decrease in people (52%) who believe open markets have quality products. Same arguments can be placed here. Traditional open markets don’t have branded shops and outlets. Although the open markets in Delhi (including the Priya Market) do have a lot of branded shops (in fact, around 75% of the shops in Priya Market are of reputed brands) , but they are still lower in number than that of shopping malls. 83% of the people agree that new style, new design products are available in Shopping Malls. A relatively lesser number of people (71%) believe the same for open markets. This shows that people prefer Shopping Malls over open markets in terms of product quality and product availability

Only 13% believed that Shopping Malls provided good bargains. It’s not a surprise, since Shopping Malls generally house branded shops , the discounts are very rare to come by. While 79% believe that open markets provide good bargains. This is probably the result of the various unbranded shops in open markets which provide huge discounts.

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The next result was a surprising one as Shopping Mall was given a slightly more preference than open markets in terms of social and eco-friendly environment. Since most of the young people prefer Shopping Malls and frequently visit Shopping Malls even if they don’t buy anything, Shopping Malls have turned out to be the hangout place for these people. Traditional hangout places like public parks or even open markets have been shunned and Shopping Malls have taken over as the best place to socialize with friends and family. Moreover, more and more Shopping Malls are being constructed with state of the art infrastructure and design. These Shopping Malls are doing everything to lure the customers with better entertainment facilities and a better social environment. These are probably the reasons why people believe that Shopping Malls are a socially better option to hang out. Again, since Shopping Malls have a dedicated maintenance department, they look much cleaner than open markets which are generally maintained by the Municipal Board. Hence, people believe that Shopping Malls are more eco-friendly than open markets. Our background research contradicts this fact though; and the interviews with different people associated with both Malls and markets revealed that Shopping Malls have a bigger negative impact in the environment than open markets. Probably, a lack of technical knowledge on environmental and energy issues led our surveyed people to conclude that Shopping Malls are more eco-friendly than open markets. Overall (not relatively, absolutely) people did believe that both open markets and Malls are energy-guzzlers and generate a lot of wastes.

Undoubtedly, 97% of the people believed that Shopping Malls have better parking facilities. Open Markets don’t have good parking facilities (Priya Market doesn’t have and people park their cars just beside the road).

62% of the people said ‘no’ when asked if buying from Shopping Malls was a matter of high social status for them. People generally visit Shopping Malls for the quality of products and the good entertainment facilities; status has nothing to do with it. But we cannot ignore the rest 38%, there are people (especially the rich and the super-rich) who do consider social implications before visiting a place.

Factors like entertainment, availability of food stalls and facilities like central air conditioning, elevators, escalators etc. play a huge role in luring people to Shopping Malls. Although many people don’t buy anything , they go to shopping malls simply because of these factors. As stated earlier, Shopping Mall has become hangout place for most of the general public. Almost 90% of the surveyed people too agree with these facts.

Even though Shopping Malls have been preferred over open markets in majority of the points above but overall almost half the people chose open markets and the other half Shopping Malls. This might be a surprising result for many (including us) but after proper and careful analysis some reasons have been meted out as to why among the surveyed people roughly 50% of the people still preferred open markets. One of the main reasons being prices of products in Shopping Malls and that in open

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markets. The Indian society hugely comprises of the middle class families. The number of rich and super rich families is relatively much lower. The middle class families like to adhere to a certain budget. They compare prices in both malls and markets and prefer the place where stuff is less costly. And since products in shopping malls are generally pricey, open markets are preferred by these people in this regard. Moreover, the shopping mall boom in India has been prevalent only during the last decade. There is still much more time for it to reach its full potential. Also, in India, shopping malls have been popular and rising only in the big metros (Delhi, Bangalore, Mumbai etc.). It is still a long way out to reaching people in small cities and towns. Our online survey comprised of people not only from the Delhi region but also people from other smaller towns and cities of India. So, accordingly 50% of the people did not prefer Shopping Malls as they are still to see the full potential of the Shopping Mall industry. But with the exponential rate with which the Shopping Mall Industry have been growing, it won’t be far when Shopping Malls will penetrate the lives of these people too.

Analysis of shopkeeper survey data:

82% of the shopkeepers who took the survey believed potential for sales in malls were high. When the same question was asked to the shopkeepers about open markets, 68% of them said that potential for sales in open markets is high. The relatively higher potential of sales in Shopping Malls can be due to the popularity of shopping malls in Delhi. Shopping Mall density in Delhi is quite high than the other places in India. The NCR has been the place where the Shopping Mall boom has been the most effective. With this growth in view, the shopkeepers in NCR today believe that potential for sales is higher in India. (One thing to note here that the same cannot be said for other smaller cities of India. Since the survey included only shopkeepers from Delhi, the results will only be Delhi based).

Many of the surveyed shopkeepers believed that the layout and categorization of shops is much better in Shopping Malls than in open markets. This point cannot be disagreed with. It is common knowledge that that the layout of shops and stalls is quite efficient in Shopping Malls. While most open markets have shops in a disorderly manner. Although Priya Market did have some order in the layout of the shops, it still is far behind in this respect as compared to Shopping Malls like Select City Walk and DLF Malls.

Like the customers, the shopkeepers too believed that pleasant surroundings, interior design and entertainment facilities in Malls do have a positive effect on the customers and help in luring them into the Malls.

Finally, the shopkeepers in both Malls and open markets were asked where they would like to put their shops in if they are given a choice. The answer we got was a little surprising. Here too, 50% of the shopkeepers went for Shopping Malls and the other half for open markets. The shopkeepers in both Malls and open markets opted to stay at their respective places without any change. Even though some shopkeepers in

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Priya Market did agree that potential for sales in Shopping Malls is better and there has been an ever increasing growth in the Shopping Mall sector, they still wanted to stay in the open market business as they consider the Shopping Malls as their arch rivals and it would be like accepting defeat if they too shifted their shops to Shopping Malls.

Solutions:

Pros , Cons and solution

Our study and analysis of the data obtained from surveys and interviews revealed that both Shopping Malls and open markets have their share of pros and cons. Although, the general belief is that Shopping Malls are energy guzzlers, but our interview data shows that they have a better potential in utilising the resources optimally and reusing the resources as compared to open markets. In this section, we will describe pros and cons of both Shopping Malls and open markets and the scope of modifications and improvements that can be brought in both these sectors for better utilisation of resources with minimum impact on the environment.

PROS and CONS of open markets

In terms of energy use, open markets don’t have escalators, elevators and central air conditioning and hence consume much lesser energy in this respect as compared to Shopping Malls. But it is to be noted that the general public do prefer these things and take these factors into consideration while visiting a place.

Prices of goods and products in open markets are lower and reasonable compared to Shopping Malls. This fact was further supported by the interview with Mr.Katyati (Mall manager, DLF City Centre) who said that a product may have a higher price in Shopping Malls than in open markets. Same was verified by the analysis on the data collected through the customer survey.

Parking facilities are a big minus in case of open markets. Lack of proper parking facilities in these markets has always been a problem not only in Delhi but also in other parts of India.

Open markets lack entertainment facilities as compared to Shopping Malls

Open markets lack the cleanliness that exist in Shopping malls.

Open Markets can better cope up with natural calamities as they provide open areas as well as easy exits.

PROS and CONS of Shopping Malls

Shopping Malls are energy guzzlers. The central air conditioning, escalators, elevators etc. consume a huge amount of energy. The lighting systems and interior design of Shopping Malls too contribute to the over-consumption of energy.

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All the shops in Shopping Malls are rented under direct control of the authority, the managing committee of malls. So there is a better control on shops and decisions can be quickly and efficiently taken. Whereas in open markets, either they are under the control of Government or there is some association which is controlling. In both the cases, the control of the management authority is much less and thus there is a less concern for energy conservation also because the burden of management is widely spread.

Parking facilities are much better in the modern Shopping Malls and has been one of the biggest factors contributing to the growth of Malls.

Shopping Mall products are overpriced. Discounts are pretty scarce and results in lot of people actually not buying anything from the shops in Malls.

The number of shops per square metre of area is much greater in case of shopping malls. There is better utilisation of space in Shopping Malls than in open markets which would require a large area to house the same number of shops. This is also a disadvantage as there is a problem of space crunch in most of the Malls and there is very less space outside the malls for free roaming. (Recently, there have been Malls in Delhi which have been constructed over a large area with adequate amount of free space around it).

Although, Shopping Malls have adequate parking facilities, traffic problems have been noticed in the roads leading upto and leaving from Shopping Malls. Proper Mall specific traffic rules are still to be implemented in many cities of India in the roads around Shopping Malls. Proper positioning of the malls is not done which leads to these traffic issues.

Proposed Solution :

Before doing the surveys and interviews, we believed that open markets would be much better than Shopping Malls ecologically. It is still the case but not to the extent that we thought. After the careful analysis of the interview and survey data, we observed that open markets also consume significant amounts of energy. Moreover, the scope of recycling and reusing the waste materials from Shopping Malls is much better than those from open markets. The reason being: in open markets, which are either under the control of Government or some association, the control of the management authority over individual shops is much less and thus there is a less concern for energy conservation also because the burden of management is widely spread. While, all the shops in Shopping Malls are rented under direct control of the authority, the managing committee of malls. So there is a better control on shops and decisions regarding recycling and other proper eco-friendly practices can be quickly and efficiently taken.

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Mentioned below are some solutions proposed by us to increase the efficiency in energy output of both Shopping Malls and open markets:

Green rating systems for market places especially Shopping Malls. Recent studies in buildings in India have shown that there is a large potential for energy savings (upto 40%) in commercial Shopping Malls in end use such as lighting, cooling, ventilation, refrigeration etc. The Bureau of Energy Efficiency, Ministry of Power (Govt. Of India) has proposed to introduce the STAR Rating Program for buildings which would create a demand in the market for energy efficient buildings based on actual performance of the building in terms of specific energy usage. These rating systems need to be extended to Shopping Malls as soon as possible.

Merely introducing rating systems wouldn’t do. Shopping Malls and markets which exceed their energy usage and wastage generation limits must be severely penalised by the government. Government can make the cost of per unit electricity inversely proportional to the rating of the building. This will make malls and open markets more efficient on energy basis since they will try to be as efficient as possible in order to have less cost per unit of electricity.

Proper parking facilities must be introduced in open markets. Usually, it is observed that vehicles are parked on the road itself near open markets due to lack of parking space. Government or the association controlling the market should construct parking facilities near open markets and defaulters must be fined heavily.

Strict traffic rules and regulations must be implemented in and around the areas having Shopping Malls to ensure people park their vehicles only in the parking space provided in Malls and also to prevent blockage of roads near Shopping Malls.

Better management of wastes (especially plastic waste) involving proper collection and disposal. Currently, most of the Shopping Malls do have a proper wastage disposal system. But the same lacks in open markets. Moreover, in both Shopping Malls and open markets the wastes generated must be placed into separate biodegradable and non-biodegradable bins which is not generally followed in either Shopping Malls or open markets.

Regular energy audits should be conducted by the government on both Shopping Malls and open markets.

Trigeneration systems, absorption chillers and, hybrid chilled beam/low temperature variable air volume air conditioning system and water recycling should be made mandatory in all the major energy consuming Shopping Malls. This way there will be an even better utilisation of the energy consumed by

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these Shopping Malls. Some kind of energy generation systems can also be introduced in major open markets by the association controlling it.

Other means to increase energy efficiency like using more energy-efficient light bulbs, planting more green plants, instead of flowers (which are more expensive) and optimizing the use of escalators by turning them on only just a few minutes before the mall opens must be adopted by shopping malls.

Our project required us to carry out the detailed analysis of the Energy consumption between Open Market like Priya shopping complex and a Shopping Mall like DLF promenade. And consequently we tried to answer the question about the sustainability of the rise in malls that the city has witnessed in the past decade.

Through various stages that we have been through in our field project, it has been realized that the analysis is very complex in nature and requires understanding of the shape that Indian Economy has taken since the beginning of Globalization scene. First thing that we realized is that development of mall is driven by the consumer - centric growth approach which was famously inspired from American culture. Then we realized that this is not the whole story as despite less demand malls are coming up and seen empty in cities like Gurgaon. Although malls came out to be much more energy hungry than open market but their utility over the open market is so high that it is not possible to revert back to old school shopping complex.

What is actually required and is now been followed by government is a hybrid of the two that incorporates the needs of people along with the energy measures. This seems to be achieved with adoption of some measures that may leads to high initial cost but will ultimately help for the betterment of society. Through the interviews it seems that everyone is slowly yet surely turning towards the above given solution and the problem of energy consumption with malls does not comes out to be a grave problem as it was perceived earlier.

Limitations of our study

Our study has some loop holes because of some limitations in it. They are as follow:

Survey done on customers couldn’t include people with all age-groups. They were in between 18-30 hence limiting the study by being influenced by customers of particular age-group rather than of all age-groups.

Since 60% of customer’s survey was done online, it also leads to some non-Delhites also filling the survey. This may lead to change in data as compared to what was expected because of possibility of different mind setups. One major reason is that malls are more common in major cities in India like Delhi rather than other parts.

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We were unable to directly talk to someone in Energy Bureau, thus limiting our data.

Shopkeepers were a bit non co-operative while asked to fill out the survey thus leading to unfair answers when we sometimes requested them to fill.

View of shopkeepers was biased. If they were from open market, they tended to favour open markets only, (even though agreeing on lot of other questions suggesting malls are better) and same was the case with shopkeepers from malls.

We haven’t done any verification of the data which we got from the people interviewed due to lack of sources. Hence our study is based on assumption that whatever data we got is correct and questions were truthfully answered.

Shopkeepers in some of the branded stores avoided filling up the survey or answering to our questions. The reason they told us was that they were strictly instructed by their bosses not to entertain any sort of questions to anyone.

Our data collection and interviews were scattered i.e. out of the people interviewed, some were from one mall and some from other, hence may leading to inappropriate observations.

Only one person under each specific position was interviewed, i.e. only one mall manager, only one maintenance secretary and so on. Thus in overall sense, more of people under each category should have been interviewed for better general data.

Citations/References for background information:-

1. " Adhyayan" , School Of Management Studies

http://www.smslucknow.com/v2_2010/pdf/Adhyayan.pdf#page=39

2. Term referred by Mr. Tripathi of DLF India in his Interview.

3. " Adhyayan" , School Of Management Studies

4. “Transforming a retail centre into a brand through professional mall management" Prof. R K Sharma , Institution : IJRCM

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http://www.ijrcm.org.in/download.php?name=ijrcm-3-Evol-1_issue-2.pdf&path=uploaddata/ijrcm-3-Evol-1_issue-2.pdf#page=47

5. "Road Map For Energy Efficiency in Building" , Sanjay Seth, Organisation : BEE

6. Bureau of Energy Efficiency, Ministry of Power, Govt. Of India, “Scheme for bee star rating for shopping malls”, January,2011

7. http://www.environmentalpollutioncenters.org/shopping-mall/

8. "Mall Management - A Growing Phenomenon in Indian Retail Industry" , June 2007, J.L.L. Meghraj