The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI) and United Technologies Corporation (UTC) have launched a Centre of Excellence for Energy Efficient Buildings in India. The Centre has been established at a time when the Government of India has introduced the Smart City Programme to address the challenge of rapid urbanization and the efficient use of energy resources. The Centre will work towards the development of an energy- use reporting framework for existing buildings, evaluation of the existing building energy rating systems, derivation of tools and techniques for energy management, real time reporting of consumption, and identifi cation and cost benefi t analysis of conservation measures. Globally, buildings account for 40 per cent of the total energy consumption. By using energy efficient technologies, energy consumption could be reduced by up to 60 per cent. In India, the building sector accounts for approximately 35 per cent of the total energy consumption and is growing at a rate of eight percent annually. The Centre will first conduct a pan-India study of 100 buildings in a wide range of climatic zones, covering cities such as Allahabad, Ajmer, Visakhapatnam, Varanasi, Delhi-NCR, Mumbai, Chennai, Bengaluru, Kolkata, Hyderabad, Pune, Ahmedabad, Surat, Jaipur, etc. These have been selected as per the Smart Cities Programme recently initiated by the Centre. The study will include an energy survey, derivation of tools and techniques for identification and cost benefit analysis of Energy Conservation Measures (ECMs), calibration and validation of simulation tools, development of Measurement and Verification (M&V) protocol for implementation of ECMs, development of financial mechanism, development of remote monitoring protocol and review and revision of existing building energy standards/codes/rating systems. The initiative is expected to deliver the proposed results within the next five years.