Pawan Mulukutla

Executive Program Director - Integrated Transport, Clean Air and Hydrogen

Bio

Pawan Mulukutla is the Executive Program Director - Integrated Transport, Clean Air and Hydrogen at WRI India. Pawan is responsible for providing strategic direction and implementing the overarching objectives of these programs. He also leads the teams’ development of synergistic and action-oriented research programs to support India’s ambitious decarbonization journey through effective, equitable and inclusive solutions. His leadership at WRI India builds upon the ongoing global dialogue and collaborations towards transitioning to sustainable energy consumption models based on low-carbon pathways.

Pawan has over two decades of professional experience working at the intersection of urban mobility, energy and environment. He has been at the forefront of various policy developments at the national and sub-national levels to improve the overall energy consumption profile of the transport sector. One of his recent milestones has been leading WRI India’s knowledge support to the development of the National Green Hydrogen Mission announced by the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy, Government of India. With technical expertise in the energy and transport domains, Pawan has also enabled the development of several other policy initiatives aimed at the electrification of public transport solutions. He has been a critical force in enabling sub-national systemic changes that have led to the ongoing acceleration of electric mobility at the state level.

His work also focuses on enabling the co-creation and scale-up of multi-sectoral solutions to mitigate air pollution at the municipal level. Over the years, he has provided strategic direction and impetus to our work with various city-level agencies to implement action plans and solutions to enhance air quality with a focus on transport emission reduction, clean construction practices, and road dust and waste burning reduction.

A well-known sustainable mobility specialist, Pawan has been part of various national & international panels and coalitions on sustainable transportation. Pawan also writes extensively on the themes of sustainable mobility, green hydrogen economy, air and public transport transformation for some of the leading media houses like Hindustan Times, Scroll, Times of India, Hindu etc. Pawan’s areas of interest include India's pathway to a green hydrogen economy, value chain systems, skill development, energy storage, charging infrastructure planning framework, EV asset financing and air pollution mitigation.

When not working, Pawan can be found practicing or teaching meditation and mindfulness techniques and playing tennis.

Publications

Understanding Global Hydrogen Strategies
WRI India’s webinar series on "Understanding Global Hydrogen Strategies" aim to facilitate an understanding of the various approaches taken by countries to develop a robust clean hydrogen ecosystem. The two-part webinar series held on August 10, 2022, and October 20, 2022, featured the...
by Soham Kshirsagar, Shubham Mishra, Anuraag Nallapaneni, Anindita Bhattacharjee and Pawan Mulukutla - July 2023

Publication
Topics: Sustainable Cities
Geography: India
Assessing the Viability of Using Autorickshaws for Urban Freight Delivery in India
It is estimated that, between 2020 and 2030, India’s freight activity will increase fivefold (NITI Aayog et al. 2021). To meet the rising demand cost-effectively, we need to explore new forms of micro-mobility-based, last-mile freight modes with a focus on low-emissions cargo transportation and...
by Rohan Rao, Sudeept Maiti and Pawan Mulukutla - May 2023

Publication
Topics: Sustainable Cities
Geography: India
Financial Analysis of Charging station (FACt)
The MS-Excel-based tool ‘Financial Analysis of Charging station (FACt)’ (the “Tool”) has been developed to help build an understanding of the business case for rolling out public charging infrastructure for electric vehicles (EVs) in the Indian context. It is a flexible, transparent, and user-...
by Pawan Mulukutla, Shyamasis Das and Priya Bansal - March 2023

Publication
Geography: India
Decarbonizing India’s Road Freight
Urban freight transport is of crucial importance to the economic vitality of urban areas, providing both urban residents and businesses the necessary goods and services. Today, close to 71 percent of the freight transported in the country is completed on road. However, although it provides...
by Pawan Mulukutla, Rohan Rao, Himani Rangoonwala and Krithi Venkat - January 2023

Publication
Topics: Sustainable Cities
Geography: India
Safety Readiness of Electric Vehicle Batteries in India
World Resources Institute India (WRI India) hosted a webinar on ‘Safety Readiness of Electric Vehicle (EV) Batteries in India’ to raise awareness regarding the safety challenges of EV batteries and solutions to overcome them. This document highlights the insights shared by the panelists on the...
by Dr. Parveen Kumar, Pawan Mulukutla and Ashish Rawat - October 2022

Publication
Topics: Sustainable Cities
Geography: India
Rolling out Electric Buses
The Guidebook is a ready reckoner for transit agencies to help them adopt a calibrated approach to induct electric buses in their services. This is to ensure that the technology shift neither disrupts the quality of the bus service nor becomes burdensome for the transit agencies. Such a phased...
by Pawan Mulukutla, Madhav Pai, Shyamasis Das and Anirudh Ray - March 2022

Publication
Topics: Sustainable Cities
Geography: India