Carbon Zero Challenge (CZC)
Carbon Zero Challenge (CZC) is a pioneering initiative by IIT Madras.
It is an all India Eco-innovation and Entrepreneurship contest with a vision to “ To create a global impact by addressing three major Planetary crisis – Resource Depletion, Pollution, and Climate change through powerful interventions, innovative technologies, entrepreneurship, and policy interventions”.The primary goal of the contest is to foster cutting-edge deep-tech and circular economy solutions that address Environment challenges in Energy, Materials, Agriculture, Air and Water domains. By leveraging the collective ingenuity and expertise of talented individuals from across India, the challenge seeks to build eco-start-ups which can address the planetary crises such as Climate change, Pollution and Food security.
AquaMAP partially funded CZC 3.0 and 4.0. Faculty members from AquaMAP were also a part of CZC mentoring and reviewing committees.
Summary of CZC 3.0:
CZC 3.0 was launched in August 2023, receiving 780 registrations and 408 applications. After two rounds of evaluation, the top 25 teams were shortlisted, including 5 teams focusing on the water theme. Mr. Raghuthama Rao closely monitored the water teams as the reviewer. Business training was provided by GDC, while environmental metric training was facilitated by Climate Collective and Prof. Ramesh Srinivasan. The winners of the 3rd cohort were Suryashakti, Amvyrad Greenrich, Electromethup, ArimaAran, Agnicart, and Base’p Sustainable Foods.
Summary of CZC 4.0:
CZC 4.0 was launched in January 2024, attracting around 835 registrations and 501 applications. The top 25 teams were selected in April 2024, and Susmafia conducted the training sessions for this cohort. Five water-focused teams were selected, with 4 supported by AquaMAP. Prof. Mathavakumar serves as the reviewer for these teams.
CZC 4.0 Grand Expo happened from 26th to 28th October 2024. 22 teams have presented their prototypes during the final round and top 6 teams (one team is working on water-Electropulse Innovations) were recognized after stringent evaluation. These 6 teams will get seed grant of upto INR 10 Lakhs each.
