Cities are crucial sites for achieving socio-technical transitions in technology and infrastructure systems. Raising building energy efficiency (BEE) through new construction or retrofitting holds particular relevance to sustainability transitions since this requires diffusion of new technologies and energy management practices. In pursuit of this, city policymakers around the world are increasingly utilising mixes of multiple policy instruments.

On an average, India has more than 3000 Cooling Degree Days (CDD). The multifamily public housing being constructed under India’s Prime Minister Awas Yojana (PMAY) is aimed at providing formal housing to the society’s Economic Weaker Section (EWS). It is essential that this housing delivers thermally comfortable in-doors to the occupants. This study mapped the design and construction practices followed under PMAY Urban (PMAY-U) against India’s Residential Energy Building Code, Eco Niwas Samhita (ENS). The metric prescribed in ENS is Residential Envelope Transmittance Value (RETV).