As oil market uncertainty grows due to tensions in West Asia, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has urged citizens and businesses to revive work-from-home and virtual meetings wherever possible. But can reducing daily office commutes really help India conserve fuel?
According to experts, at stake is not just employee flexibility or corporate productivity, but the country’s fuel consumption, crude import dependence, and household electricity costs.
While the logic is straightforward, as fewer office trips mean lower use of petrol, diesel, cab fuel, and urban transport energy, the overall energy equation is more complicated. It is because work-from-home can shift part of the energy burden from roads and offices to homes, especially during India’s long summer months when usage of air conditioners, coolers, fans, along with lighting, laptops, routers, and other appliances remains high.
Thus, it’s no longer simply about where employees work, and the question remains whether hybrid work can realistically help India reduce fuel consumption without merely transferring costs elsewhere.
Alekhya Datta, director, electricity and renewables division at Delhi-based think tank The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI), told Business Standard that hybrid work can support India’s fuel conservation goals, especially in large urban centres.
“Hybrid work can support India’s fuel conservation and energy security objectives by reducing congestion-intensive daily commuting in major metropolitan regions, particularly among private vehicle users in the services and IT sectors,” Datta said.
“Given India’s high dependence on imported crude oil of around 85 per cent, even moderate reductions in peak-hour travel can contribute to lower transport fuel demand and associated urban emissions,” he added.
Why the commute matters
Why the commute matters
The government data says India imports over 85 per cent of its crude oil requirements, making it vulnerable to global oil market volatility and geopolitical disruptions. Higher crude prices directly affect India’s import bill, inflation, logistics costs, and foreign exchange outflows. Thus, even small reductions in avoidable fuel use are economically significant.
The clearest example of mobility-linked fuel demand came during the Covid-19 lockdowns. According to the Petroleum Planning and Analysis Cell (PPAC) of the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas (MoPNG), India’s petroleum product consumption fell 45.8 per cent in April 2020 compared with April 2019 after industrial activity and transportation were sharply curtailed during nationwide restrictions.
That collapse in demand showed how strongly fuel consumption is linked to movement, commuting, and economic activity. However, experts caution against treating lockdown-style restrictions as a model for fuel conservation.
“The better approach is calibrated hybrid work, fewer physical meetings, and reduced non-essential travel, not panic-driven shutdowns,” Pratik Vaidya, managing director at Karma Management Global Consulting Solutions Pvt Ltd, told Business Standard.
Who saves the most fuel?
Who saves the most fuel?
The fuel-saving impact of work-from-home depends heavily on how employees travel. WFH generates the largest direct savings for workers who commute long distances using petrol cars, diesel cabs, two-wheelers, office shuttles, or app-based taxi services.
The impact is smaller for employees who already use metro, suburban rail, buses, bicycles, or who live close to office locations.
This means the largest potential fuel savings are concentrated in major office corridors across places where long commutes and private transport dependence remain common, such as Bengaluru, Gurugram, Noida, Hyderabad, Pune, Mumbai, and Chennai.
Vaidya said daily commuting patterns have a direct impact on urban petrol and diesel demand. “Petrol sales are largely driven by two-wheelers and private cars, which are also the categories most heavily used for office commuting,” he said.
According to him, work-from-home should be viewed as only one part of a broader urban fuel-management strategy. “Virtual meetings, staggered office timings, carpooling and stronger public transport adoption all need to work together,” he added.
The household power bill caveat
The household power bill caveat
The challenge is that work-from-home does not eliminate energy consumption. In many cases, it simply relocates it.
A major concern is household electricity usage. According to a 2020 International Energy Agency (IEA) estimate, a day of working from home can increase household energy consumption by 7 per cent to 23 per cent compared with a day spent working at the office, depending on climate conditions, housing size, heating or cooling requirements, and appliance efficiency. In India, this becomes especially important during the summer.
As a result, a worker may save money on fuel while simultaneously paying higher electricity bills at home.
Datta noted that increased work-from-home practices can raise residential electricity consumption, particularly during summer months because of greater use of cooling appliances and digital equipment.
“However, from a long-term sustainability perspective, the trade-off remains favourable if accompanied by improvements in building energy efficiency and a cleaner power mix, since electricity can increasingly be supplied through domestic renewable energy sources, unlike imported petroleum fuels,” he said.
Why offices may also not save power
Why offices may also not save power
Another complication is that companies do not automatically save electricity simply because some employees work remotely. If workers operate from home randomly across different days, office buildings may continue running air conditioning, lighting, elevators,
cafeterias, security systems, and data infrastructure almost at normal levels.
In such situations, transport fuel use may fall slightly while office energy consumption remains largely unchanged.
According to Vaidya, the gains become more meaningful only when hybrid work is structured and coordinated. For example entire teams, departments, or floors can follow common work-from-home schedules, allowing companies to reduce facility usage more efficiently.
This can lower office transport expenses, commercial power consumption, cafeteria operations, and non-essential travel costs.
A 2024 study by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) and the Faculty of Management Studies (FMS), University of Delhi, found that organisations reported savings in office rental costs, commuting stress, and employee travel expenses under remote and hybrid work systems.
The study also noted that companies continued to worry about weaker communication, teamwork, and organisational culture under prolonged remote arrangements.
Whether hybrid work actually lowers India’s overall energy burden will depend on how intelligently companies structure flexible work systems and how effectively cities manage transport, infrastructure, and electricity demand.
The government, meanwhile, has sought to reassure citizens that there is no immediate fuel supply concern. During an inter-ministerial briefing on Monday, officials said India currently has adequate stocks of petrol, diesel, LPG, and crude oil, and urged people not to panic despite rising geopolitical tensions in West Asia.
