SDG 7: Affordable and Clean Energy

3Clean energy beyond the campus

UPES shares its energy expertise with schools, industry, policymakers and start-ups.

• Schools in the Himalaya. A Department of Science and Technology project led by Dr Mohammed Yaqoot ran sustainable energy workshops for students in remote schools of Chamoli district, Uttarakhand.
• Industry. In December 2023 UPES signed an MoU with HCLTech to develop sustainability and low-carbon solutions for the oil and gas industry, with internships for UPES students and researchers and joint webinars and forums.
• National energy policy. NITI Aayog, the Government of India's policy think tank, lists UPES among the partners of its Energy Division, alongside IITs, TERI, CEEW and the International Energy Agency. UPES's role is research, modelling and paper writing on energy-sector policy. Through the RISE Centre and its summits, UPES also hosts policy dialogue with the Governor of Uttarakhand and international bodies such as IRENA.
• Public dialogue. The annual Energy Summit, run since 2022, brings researchers, industry and policymakers together on renewables, storage, smart grids and the social side of the energy transition, with an industrial fair. Its 4th edition, the International Conference on Sustainable and Affordable Energy (ICSAE 2025), was held in hybrid mode on 11–12 November 2025. The Sustainability Fair and Himalaya Calling 2025 also covered renewable energy and climate-resilient technology.
• Advocating renewable energy. Through the RISE Centre, the Energy Summit and its net-zero roadmap, UPES speaks publicly for a shift to renewable energy beyond its own campus. Its Climate Action Plan^[12] commits to raising renewables to 30–40% of its electricity by 2030, on the way to net zero by 2060.
• Training in renewable energy. From 5 to 9 February 2024 the School of Advanced Engineering ran a short-term online course, Emerging Trends in Renewable Energy Technologies, open to outside participants. Speakers came from IIT Roorkee, IIT Madras, IIT Jodhpur, IIT (BHU), CSIR-IIP, MANIT Bhopal and Capgemini, with a Scientist-F from the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy as chief guest.
• Faculty development. UPES faculty completed a five-day online Faculty Development Programme on AI and machine learning in renewable energy forecasting, run by D Y Patil International University, Pune, in May 2026. It covered time-series forecasting, ARIMA/SARIMA, random forest and XGBoost, LSTM models, smart grid applications and explainable AI.
• Student action. The student-led GreenUp Club of the Sustainability Cluster runs clean energy awareness for students and children. During ATMOSFAIR 2024 its "Haz Hunt" treasure hunt set challenges on climate change, renewable energy and cutting carbon footprints, and its members taught children at an orphanage simple ways to save energy at home.
• Green start-ups. Runway, the UPES incubator, supports start-ups working on low-carbon technology. It runs mentorship programmes, start-up bootcamps and business-model workshops for renewable energy, green tech and circular-economy ventures, and offers technical support, prototyping facilities, investor-connect sessions and financial guidance for scaling.