Before India’s building sector can fulfil its CO2 abatement potential, it is imperative for
new build projects, especially those which provide for commercial and public functions,
to eschew the energy-intensive designs that characterized western commercial buildings
of the 20th century. In the absence of an adaptive thermal comfort standard specifically
for India’s climatic and cultural context, the current trend is simply to design airconditioned buildings to meet the stringent ASHRAE and ISO “Class A” comfort
specifications. This paper proposes a holistic Post Occupancy Evaluation (POE) study of
a cross section of Indian office buildings purposively stratified across a range of energy
intensities with diverse environmental control systems and design approach in different
climatic zones to develop an adaptive thermal comfort standard. By climatically adapting
indoor design temperatures, the standard will offer India a low-carbon development
pathway for its commercial building sector without compromising overall comfort or
productivity.