G.D. Agarwal and M.C. Mehta are fighting for the same cause- protection and conservation of the environment, according top priority to the Ganga. Both have strong views against the damming of the River Bhagirathi above Uttarkashi. If one fasted for as many as 37 days and is considered a man who is willing to die for his cause, the other as a Supreme Court lawyer, has strong principles and a never say die attitude. The two were together at Swatigram, MC’s eco farm that he set up with his Magasaysay Award money, to share valuble time together shortly after G.D. broke his fast. Here’s a DP exclusive.

Radha Mehta wife of M.C., says, “G.D. is a man who is proud of being a Hindu. And his religion is a logical progression of his scientific mind. Vedic religion, he regards, as being scientific and of divine origin. Ganga has proven to have curative and purifying qualities. The fact that the Ganga is being destroyed is great blow to the country and that’s what G.D. is prepared to die for,”

Asked how he was feeling post-hunger strike, G.D quips, “Itna confidence ho gaya hai urata ke mamle mein ab. But I am amazed at the apathy in the country. We have sounded the death knell of destruction of our dharma and sankriti. Human instincts today have come to be governed by economics. Religion is being regard as opium and culture is being crushed. India is a big market. Its biomass (animals, wood, vegetables, etc.) and now its culture along with granite, marble and iron, etc., are on sale.”

Questioned how the younger generations could be sensitised to care for environment, he pronounces: “They cannot be sensitised by mere talks but by example and interaction. When I was at IIT, students came to me at an age when they could not be sensitised. I then decided that there was no point in being in the IIT system. If only our politicians had been imaandar (honest).”

Asked what was paramount in his thoughts at the moment, he reveals, “Only God will decide. Till last year I had a feeling that courts would decide. Now I have left everything to God in a way. If God doesn’t come to my rescue, I can noting. On February 19, there was not the remotest of chance that the government would react. It did. I don’t know who went to the government and who interacted. There were many such as Swami Swaroopanandji, Sankaracharya of Puri, Swami Chidananadji, Paritosh Tyagi, Rajendra Singh who were trying to convince people, at their own levels. But where and what really conspired I am not aware. A draft letter was first shown to me and I got a message from God that I should agree.”

The next inevitable question is who can take his fight forward and pat comes the reply, “Girdhar Maharaj. And also Dr. Bharat Jhunjhunwala and Dr. Ravi Chopra of PSI can come together to form a group.”

Speaking about the time when he himself got hooked on to the idea of preservation of the Ganga, he recalls, “I was visiting Gangotri along with M.C. and enroute stopped at Arivihar Ashram between Uttarkashi and Bhatwari and met Girdhar Maharaj. While he was speaking, it come as an inner force from God and slowly became a resolve. Girdhar Maharaj was responsible for pushing me. If he could ignite that kind of passion in me then he can now ignite similar passion in others. He is in the right location, is forceful and well-known to people in the area. He can be very effective,”

Standing like a rock along with G.D.’s cause is M.C. Mehta. He says, ”It is not an ordinary fight; it is a fight for safeguarding the heritage and culture of our country. Minus the presence the Taj Mahal and the Ganga, the concept of India is inconceivable. They play a vital role in the history, culture and every thing else that makes India worthwhile. The energy that we need to preserve the Ganga today unfortunately is much more than we the energy we need to create concrete malls.”

Speaking about the Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF) notification and the constitution of the National Ganga River Basin Authority, he states, “The Authority, which has been set up under the chairmanship of the prime minister, is no solution. Of course, is no solution. Of course, it is a welcome step and should merely be considered a planning and advisory body.

The PM and others that constitute this body occupy busy posts and will hardly have any time and energy left to look into day-to-day action against polluters and those causing pollution at source in industries, municipal bodies, corporations, etc., apart from developmental activities taking place along the rivers. There should be an executive body for daily monitoring and execution of all the schemes. There should be a VC of eminence, independent with expertise in environmental matters along with this board with other whole time members from different disciplines.”

Expressing his doubt about the efficacy of the National Ganga River Basin Authority, G.D. averse, “It can co-opt up to five experts on different issue. If this is not done well it will become a closed ineffective group. It has to have non-officials and real experts. At the first meeting of the National Ganga River Basin Authority, the course of action till after the elections should be decided with urgency.”

The Times of India (New Delhi), 1 March 2009

After being caught in bureaucratic red tape and disputes between states for nearly 30 years, the ambitious River Inter-Linking Project may soon become a reality with a link between Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh ready for launch in the next three years.

In the next three years, the Ken-Betwa river link between the two states may become the first river inter-linking project of the country.

The Detailed Project Report (DPR) of Ken-Betwa link has been received by the centre. “Since it has been declared a national project the Centre will fund 90 per cent of the cost,” Water Resources Minister Saifuddin Soz said.

The minister said that in the three years, the Ken-Betwa link could become the first river inter-linking project to be commissioned in the country.

A tripartite MoU was signed between the union minister for water resources and chief ministers of UP and MP in 2005 for preparing DPR of Ken-Betwa link.

The completion of the DPR in a record two years time was a big achievement for scientists and engineers involved in the project.

Conceived in 1980, the river inter-linking project has been mired in bureaucratic red tape and disputes between states sharing river water.

A Parliamentary Standing Committee on Water Resources had recently lamented the tardy progress of the ambitious project.

Thirty links (16 under Peninsular Component and 14 under Himalayan Component) were identified for preparation of feasibility reports.

The inter-linking proposals envisage additional benefits of 25 million hectares of irrigation from surface water, 10 million hectares by increased use of ground water and generation of 34,000 MW of power apart from incidental benefits of flood moderation, navigation, water supply, salinity and pollution control.

The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has been providing satellite imagery data on river basins and water resources in the country to a task force on inter-linking of major rivers.

Aerial images of the river basins, valleys and hilly and terrain areas being provided to facilitate mapping of the linkages since the task force was set up in 2003.

The satellite images with 5.8m high-resolution will enable the task force to compile the data and submit a comprehensive report to the government.

The task force has so far identified 30 major links in the networking of rivers to minimise the devastation caused by floods and hardship due to recurring droughts in several parts of the country.

The Pioneer (Dehradun), 9 March 2009

Central Water Commission, Himalayan Ganga Division, organised a one-day workshop under the Information, Education and Communication Scheme of the Ministry of Water Resources on March 5. The workshop was inaugurated by Dr. V.N. Sharda, director, Central Soil and Water Conservation Research and Training Institute. The delegates were welcomed by Bhagat Singh, superintending engineer, Central Water Commission.

The title of the workshop was ‘Water Resources Development in Uttarakhand. The aim of the workshop was to spread general awareness about the various issues related to water as a resource. It brought various stakeholders including planners, academicians, professionals, scientists and NGO representatives on a single platform with the aim of promoting informed utilisation of this source that is fast becoming scare.

In his keynote address, Dr. Sharda highlighted various issues related to hydropower. “We face challenges in the water sector in the form of declining per capita availability of water, deterioration in water quality, over-exploitation of ground water resources, leading to the lowering of water table in some areas, adverse effects of water related disasters,” he added.

He projected that the demand for water for all purposes whether domestic, irrigation or industrial need will increase with each passing day. The cities will need clean water to sustain improvements in public health and sanitation. The rural community will need stable sources of water for their economic survival as their livelihood depends mostly on agriculture.

He stressed that we can achieve the objective of efficient use of available water resources only with the active participation of all sections of society. For this reason, the government encourages participatory management by involving not only the various government agencies but also the users and the other stake holders like local bodies such as municipalities and Panchayati Raj institutions, ensuring an effective role of planning, designing, development and management of water resources schemes as per national water policy.

The other participants on the occasion were representatives from THDC, NIH, Roorkee, IIRS, Dehradun, IIT, Roorkee, G.B. Pant Institute, Central Water Commission, Irrigation Department, Dehradun, SJVNL, etc. A total of 12 technical papers were presented on the occasion. Some of the topics that came up for discussion were sediment in the melting waters of Gangotri glacier, impact of climate change on the Himalayan rivers apart from others. The vote of thanks was delivered by T.S.N. Rai, executive engineer, Central Water Commission.

The Times of India (New Delhi), 11 March 2009

Doon is set to face another major water crisis. Reason: Over-exploitation of its ground water resources has led to depletion of the main Dehradun aquifer.

There are as many as 200 tubewells in Doon Valley that extract as much as 1,000 litres per minute per cubic mts of ground water while operating for as long as 10 hours a day. This assumes significance as most of Dehradun’s potable water supply is dependent on ground water. Eighty per cent supply to Doon Valley is through tubewells, which are directly dependent on ground water for recharge. Most of these tubewells are under the Jal Sansthan, while a few are under the irrigation and other departments.

However, water levels in summers have fallen drastically in recent times and availability of potable water continues to be a big challenge.

Albeit Dehradun has vast ground water reserves, the speedy rate of withdrawal has certainly is a matter of concern. In addition, most of the rainwater runs off to the plain areas depriving the valley of its benefit.

In recent years, Doon valley has been among the top few cities in the country that have received record rainfall during monsoons. However, rampant construction has considerably shrunk the surface area meant for percolation of water into the Earth.

The coming up of settlements alongside seasonal rivers is another grave problem. These riverside clusters of houses have substantially reduced the potential surface area of recharge. The surface areas of seasonal rivers and nullahs that criss-cross the valley have reduced the possibility of ground water recharge to a big extent.

Geologists informed that the northern area of Doon Valley was best suited for ground water recharge, as the typical geological formations facilitate easy percolation of rainwater down into the water table. But rampant construction in this part of Dehradun is proving detrimental for the same.

The state’s Central Ground Water Board, which conducts an assessment every five years, has recently revealed a substantial depletion in the Dehradun aquifer, which is the main source of water here.

“The main Dehradun aquifer is fast getting depleted due to speedy withdrawls,” said Dr. R.P. Singh, director, Central Ground Water Board, Dehradun. He said there has been indiscriminate tapping of ground water resources due to lack of effective management and there is an urgent need to sensitise the masses on the issue.

Dr. Singh said the potential of the main aquifer in Doon valley could substantially reduce in the days to come if best management practices vis-à-vis extraction of ground water resources were not undertaken immediately. He admitted that rampant construction and encroachments at the site of seasonal rivers and nullahs are also decresing the rate of recharge.

The Environment Protection Act of 1986 calls for conservation of ground water and a check on its injudicious exploitation. It is thus more important to conserve than to develop underground water sources.

Fortunately, while ground water depletion is a major challenge, the two major rivers that crosses the two ends of Dehradun - Ganga and Yamuna - are maintaining a steady flow as of now.

“The quantity of water in both Ganga and Yamuna Rivers has been consistent and there is no immediate threat as of now. But we still need to continue monitoring of these two rivers,” said N.N. Rai, executive engineer, Central Water Commission, Himalaya Ganga Division, Dehradun. He said a comprehensive database linked to overall water availability should be immediately put together.

“While Gangotri glacier will make an interesting subject of study for many, a conclusion can only be authentic if it comes through a long-standing study amply backed by proper database,” said Rai.

Recharge through water harvesting has also not picked up much in the state, and albeit there are provisions for it they are seldom made mandatory.

However, the Central Water Ground Board in one of innovative measures has successfully.

The Tribune (Chandigarh), 7 March 2009

To have water for drinking, is the basic need and right of a human being and to supply, clean and bacteria free drinking water to all humans is the responsibility of the government.

With the enormous increase in the population, it has become all the more difficult to manage water resources in order to ensure that at least drinking water is available to every one in which ever remote corner one stays. For this purpose, the water has to be conserved during monsoons and collected in artificial tanks by putting suitable pipes on slanting roofs of the houses, popularly called ‘roof top harvesting’ constructing reservoirs/dams, etc.

We have to check against water wastage due to over use or not closing pipes even after use or leaks in pipes and taps, etc. Though government has made it mandatory for the construction of all new houses to introduce the system of rain water harvesting or roof top harvesting, but it is not being rigidly followed and needs to be enforced by MDDA. This is essential to stop the misuse of drinking water and all the same keep Dehradun green to fetch more water.

Luckily, for the last so many years, the monsoons had been good and the droughts and floods too, had not been that serious but have sent sufficient signals to take necessary steps in view of the ensuing changes in weather. Well, what ever be the reason, we have to prepare ourselves for the worst times and makes necessary provisions to survive and ensure that the natural cycle is not disturbed. Besides, we have to evolve methods by which the water could be recycled again. This has to be done especially for the industries, which pollute water so that their muck is not thrown out to pollute rivers, etc.

On tree plantation day, I had given a slogan which is very essential to maintain Dehradun green, and I repeat, “If per force, you have to cut a tree, plant ten trees in that vicinity in order to counter the ill effects of that one tree cut, but ensure that all the ten trees planted survive and grow.”

Dehradun Valley though lies between Ganga and Yamuna, the two perennial sacred rivers full of water, there is scarcity of water in Dehradun and people have to get up at night to fill/fetch water. The normal supply of water in Dehradun is for two hours in the morning and two hours in the evening and that too, one hour with pressure and one hour without pressure.

In summers, this too, becomes irregular and no timings are adhered too. Of course, authorities stop construction works during the period and take other measures to stop misuse of drinking water. Failure of electricity or pumping machines are the usual causes, but alternate arrangements should be there to make uninterrupted supply, at least during normal supply hours and also for extra water supply during festivals.

To stop leakage of water through old rusted pipes, they must replace old pipes in a phased manner, for which a separate grant has to be set aside for that purpose alone. Besides, leakage is a very serious matter as they also attract various water diseases. Though some rates have been fixed for water tankers, but they are charging exorbitantly as per requirement. If you book a tanker, it takes more time as water is being supplied to others at higher rates instantly. More over when a tanker comes, there are not enough tubs/buckets in the houses to store and water goes waste as the water cannot be put in the tanks which are generally on top of the roof.

It is suggested that the water tankers should be fitted with motor pumps, which may be utilised to fill tanks generally kept on roof tops.

Regarding water rates which are being charged arbitrarily as water meters are not functioning, is linked with fixing house tax also. It is reported that two neighbours, whose requirements are almost equal, are being charged at different rates.

Though water tax has been abolished, but some people are still getting bills for the same. Such anomalies should be removed and some transparent method should be evolved to charge water to the satisfaction of all concerned.

We do not know whether the water regulatory commission is working or not, but it should be made functional and to devise methods to fix proper rates.

Hindustan Times (New Delhi), 14 March 2009

Optimal use of water through efficient rainwater management is a must for increasing foodgrain production and ensuring sustainable growth of farm sector, Dr. J.S. Samra, chief executive officer, National Rainfed Area Authority (NRAA), said today.

The next green revolution would emerge from improvement in rain-fed agriculture technology aimed at developing systems with low water requiring crops and breaking the crop-yield barriers, he told The Tribune here.

Emphasising the need for conservation of natural resources to meet the challenge of climate change, Dr. Samra said rain-fed farming and efficient water management with crop intensification could help achieve increased crop productivity and food security.

Expressing concern that only 29 per cent rainwater was being put to productive use, he called for massive efforts for rainwater harvesting and reorientation of policies and priorities for sustainable growth.

He disclosed that out of the 85 million hectare area under cultivation, 60 per cent was rain-fed and accounted for 40 per cent of total food production and in spite of best efforts, the target of 4 per cent agriculture growth during 10th Plan had not be achieved. A record foodgrain production of 230.67 million tonnes was achieved in 2007-08, but the growth rate was stuck at 2.8 per cent.

Referring to global warming, Dr. Sarna said the phenomenon of rising temperature by two or three degrees over a period of 100 years could not be changed but the intensity of frequency of extreme conditions leading to floods, cyclones and droughts could be handled by expanding the command area.

Maintaining that uncertain rainfall made the farmers apprehensive, he said in Rajasthan the farmers wait for second rain for sowing the crops as they fear that in the event of dry spell after first rains, their crops would be ruined.

Detailing the programmes undertaken by the government to expand the irrigated area, Dr. Samra disclosed that a Rs. 16,500 crore Integrated Water Management Programme with rainwater harvesting as major component was under implementation, Rs. 25,000 crore were being spent of National Agriculture development scheme and allocations under National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) had been increased from Rs. 16,500 crore in 2007-08 to Rs. 31,000 crore during the current year.

CSSRI celebrates foundation day
It was a rare opportunity for 1,000 odd farmers and students to visit the fields and interact with scientists at the Rabi Kisan Mela organised by Central Soil Salinity Research Institute (CSSRI), Karnal, to mark its 40th foundation day.

All institutes under the ICAR located at Karnal displayed their technologies and agri-products including, seeds, pesticides and agricultural implements at the mela.

The farmers were informed about the technologies developed at the CSSRI for reclamation of salt affected soils, use of poor quality irrigation water, crop diversification, medicinal and aromatic plants and salt tolerant varieties, etc.

The Tribune (Chandigarh), 15 March 2009

Experts and policy planners expressed serious concern over water resources in Rajasthan depleting fast and the haphazard and unregulated use of ground water changing the safe area into “dark zones” at a workshop on “Water scenario: Efficient use and management” here over the week-end.

The Central Ground Water Board organised the two-day workshop to evolve policy guidelines and prepare a roadmap for sustainable management of ground water resources, besides generating awareness among the stakeholders and encourage them to collect the relevant statistics.

State Principal Water Resources Secretary Ram Lubhaya, addressing the workshop, pointed out that 60 per cent of the surface water reservoirs had been filled only by half of their capacity during the previous monsoon. “Crores of rupees are being spent on water haulage in the water-deficit areas such as Pali and Bhilawara,” he said.

Mr. Lubhaya underlined the need to involve the local communities in the planning for water supply at the village level with the technical support of government departments and other agencies. He said the data collection at the block level would also help in policy formulation.

Central Ground Water Board Chairman B.M. Jha said urgent steps were needed to regulate the use of ground water in the sectors such as industry, agriculture and domestic consumption.

Geological Survey of India’s Deputy Director General V.K. Kanchan said the GSI would extend support to the state government’s Ground Water Department in the demarcation of areas suitable for artificial recharge of ground water and the check the surface and ground water pollution.

Central Ground Water Board’s Regional Director R.P. Mathur said the waste effluent discharged by dyeing and textile industrial units should be treated before its release in the open grounds. The percolation of effluents was polluting huge ground water bodies, he added.

Scientists from the Central Arid Zone Research Institute, Jodhpur, said the traditional methods for rainwater harvesting and conservation should be revived in the dry zones of the desert state. Some of the systems being tried out in western Rajasthan are baori (stepwell), jhalra (barrier) nadi (tank), tanka (reservoir) and kharin (slope).

Five working groups were formed at the workshop to prepare a roadmap for ground water management. They pertained to enhancement of water use efficiency, water recycling and reuse, rainwater harvesting and promotion of community’s role in water management.

The participants called for taking up water conservation as a mass movement and properly address the scarcity of water in the context of increasing population in the state.

A consensus emerged at the workshop in favour of making use of all options available for ensuring the water security.

The Hindu (New Delhi), 16 March 2009

Ground water has been the main stay for meeting the domestic water needs. Besides 80 per cent of rural and 50 per cent of urban population, it fulfills the irrigation needs of half of irrigated agriculture. The ease and simplicity of its extraction has played an important role in its development. This has, however, resulted in haphazard and indiscriminate use of the ground water in many parts of the country resulting in deterioration of its quality with depressing reservoirs.

Ground water situation is not very good in restricted pockets of about 300 districts in 20 states. The annual recharge of water is far less than what is consumed. The situation is more alarming in urban areas due to population pressure and industrial growth. This in turn has led to increased water consumption. The rapid pace of urbanisation has also resulted in reduction of recharge to aquifers. The increased demand of water for agriculture especially because of change in cropping pattern has further contributed to the decline in ground water levels in the country. For example paddy and cash crops consume large quantities of water that puts a lot of pressure on ground water resources.

The annual availability of ground water in the country has been assessed as 432 billion cubic metres (BCM) every year. After keeping a provision of 71 BCM per year for domestic, industrial and other uses, the available ground water resource for irrigation is 361 BCM per annum. Out of this, the present net draft is assessed as 150 BCM every year and level of ground water development as 41 per cent. The Central Ground Water Board (GG WB) monitors ground water levels through out the country through a network of 14,739 National Hydrograph, Monitoring stations. The water levels in Hydrograph stations are monitored four times in a year i.e. premonsoon (May), monsoon (August) post-monsoon (November) and winter season (January). For the country as a whole there is still a large balance of ground water potential. There are, however, certain pockets in different assessment units where ground water, development has reached a critical stage. There are 673 over-exploited blocks/talukas/watersheds where stage of ground water development is more than 100 per cent, Water levels shows declining trend in both pre and post-monsoon period over the long term. Further, there are 425 dark blocks/talukas/watershed where stage of ground water development is between 85 per cent – 100 per cent with water levels showing declining trend in both pre and post-monsoon period over the long term.

The artificial recharging can ease the ground water situation because it helps in protecting water resources and assures a constant supply of water. The CGWB has undertaken several initiatives in promoting awareness about the need for protection of rainwater wastage. Water conservation campaigns have been carried out keeping in view the various target groups like youth, children, women, farmers and villages, policy and opinion makers. The Board has been emphasising that the states should make roof-top rainwater harvesting mandatory in urban areas by amending building byelaws. Provision of roof-top rainwater harvesting system has been made mandatory in Haryana, Karnataka, Kerala, Maharashtra, Nagaland, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Uttar Pradesh and NCT of Delhi for specified categories of buildings in these states. The CGWB also provides technical guidance to state agencies, institutions, individuals and industries on the design of rainwater harvesting structures. Under the directions of Supreme Court, a Central Ground Water Authority (CGWA) was constituted in January, 1997 for the purpose of regulation and control of ground water management and development.

The Authority has been vested with several powers under the Environment Protection Act, 1986 for issuing directions and taking measures in respect of matters relating to ground water. The Authority is vested with the powers to regulate and control management and development in ground water in the country and to issue necessary regulatory directions for the purpose. The CGWA has notified 11 areas across the country for control and regulatory use of the ground water. Three of these areas are in NCT of Delhi (south, south-west districts and Yamuna flood plains), two in Haryana (Faridabad/Ballabgarh and Gurgaon town), one each in Punjab (Ludhiana), Diu, Rajasthan (Jhotwara block of Jaipur), Gujarat (Gandhinagar), West Bengal (Haldia) and Uttar Pradesh (Ghaziabad). The CGWA has conducted about 200 mass awareness programmes to popularise the concept of rain water harvesting. It has also conducted over 100 training courses throughout the country with the objective to propagate innovative and economical techniques for rain-water harvesting including roof-top rain water harvesting in urban environment. It can be hoped that the situation will improve considerably in the years to come. At present, the need of the hour is the people’s participation along with the government’s efforts in the task of recharging ground water resources.

The Himachal Times (Dehradun), 21 March 2009

Frogs are being wedded to frogs in elaborate, ritually correct weddings in Assam in an effort to appease Varun, the rain god, because there has been no rain in Assam in the past few months and the ground water is drying up. Quillagua, a Chilean city that holds the distinction of being the driest place on this Earth, is dying a parched death. Their lifeline, the river is dying. What the water companies have not taken away, far in excess of what they wee supposed to take, the mining companies have polluted to unsustainable levels. In Chamoli, Uttarakhand, the smaller glaciers have disappeared and the largest one has retreated by many miles. United Nations Development reports are warning the world that ‘Water Wars’ are on the horizon in Africa. Australia is a decade into the worst drought it has witnessed in a century. And in the latest installment of arguably the world’s sexiest spy, James Bond, the villain is not hoarding gold or oil or even arms, the traditional choices of villains the world over, but water. And that, I suppose really tells the story as it is despite all the deniers of climate change.

Ladies and gentlemen welcome to the new world, a drier world. Today water is fast becoming a resource that is all set to rival oil for value. 71 per cent of earth’s surface is covered with water. But of that, only 3 per cent is non saline. And that 3 per cent is distributed across the forms; glaciers, rivers, lakes and ground water. Not only is the human body composed primarily of water but water is one of the fundamental premises for life on earth across life forms, birds, bees and all things that breathe need water. Unfortunately, so do all other things such as agriculture and industry. Simply put, life is water intensive.

Possibly the biggest problem we face is one that is entirely man made: pollution of water sources. Urban centres in India and in many other countries are faced with the mammoth task of not only providing access to clean drinking water but of dealing with the waste that is generated. In our country despite the stringent environmental laws (all of which are obviously flouted), nearly all of our river systems are heavily polluted and many, like the Yamuna, are literally dying. From industrial effluents to human waste, we dump it all in the rivers and lakes. One of the greatest developmental challenges around the world today is access to clean water for consumption. Its lack equals a whole lot of diseases. A disproportionately large number of deaths can be related to water: lack of clean drinking water and sanitation is now the single largest cause of illness worldwide. It is estimated that by 2020, more people will have died due to water borne diseases and the lack of clean water than the HIV/AIDS pandemic. Currently the planet Earth is home to nearly six and a half billion people. And going by current trends, the figure will soon reach eight billion. And each human being needs a basic minimum quantity of water just to ensure survival. An increase in population equals a surge in demand for food, both livestock and agriculture are water intensive.

The water crisis, which might well become the defining parameter for future generations, has been precipitated by a host of complex, interlocking problems. It is simplistic and convenient to file the water crises under the larger heading of Global Warming and leave it at that. But it is at once, more complicated than that and simpler than that. Water consumption patterns that are rooted more in lifestyle choices than pragmatism, a lack of appreciation for the complex interlinking of co-dependant ecosystems as well as a callous disregard for the consequences of polluting our water sources are all contributory factors. And every time we act with a narrowness of vision we exacerbate the problem. Overdrawing of water from underground sources causes depletion to an extent that disrupts the water cycle. As the rivers and lakes begin to shrink, there is less precipitation. And that means more droughts. And that means drawing more water out of the ground with the use of technology. It is a vicious cycle the end result of which is a water crisis because essentially we are disrupting the global ecosystem, of which the water cycle is an integral part.

In an irony worthy a Greek tragedian, the first act in the drama of water crisis is going to be a global flooding. Global warming will result in rise in sea levels as the glaciers and ice caps melt, thereby depleting the Earth’s crucial reservoir of clean, non-saline water. Once the ice melts and becomes saline, not only is the Earth going to get a lot hotter because the ice caps and the glaciers act as cooling units, the rivers and streams are going to run dry. And then the groundwater becomes more precious than a finite commodity since the water cycle will no longer replenish the Earth’s water table.

Already, the process has begun but right now, at this moment we can still do some thing about it. An environmental awareness coupled with individual contributions today can make all the difference tomorrow. The technology to make our water consumption more efficient need not be high end. Making sure that no taps in your house drip can conserve more water than you realise. As will air drying your clothes instead of using a dryer. On a larger scale be aware of water pollution and contamination. Be vigilant, that factory discharging its effluents into the river is sucking the water out of your future. But most of all realise that water is truly the elixir of life and pretty soon it will run out.

The Times of India (New Delhi), 22 March 2009

Those, who have visited Haridwar and Rishikesh recently and have taken a dip in the Ganga, must have got a feel of the future-reduced quantity as well as quality of water in this holy river of national import. This should have set an alarm bell ringing, but so far it has not. The reduced water content portends the drift of things to come. Similar is the case with the other rivers in the country. But there seems to be no action plan initiated which is the need of the hour. Experts and policymakers agree that ample know-how exists to solve the water crisis; the snag lies in constraints of all kinds including economics and politics.

Says a senior citizen, “We can foresee most of our future problems. We also know how most of these can be solved. But what we lack is sincerity and will power. And this is going to prove detrimental for the well being of our future generations. The mathematics of water availability has changed in the past few years as Doon’s water grows scarcer, its population swells and environmental pressures mount with alacrity with each passing day.”

Engineer S.K. Gupta, secretary, Uttarakhand Jal Sansthan, informs that the surface water in Doon is almost depleted. “Now we are going to tap the ground water in a major way. But this too has its limits. As far as India is concerned, we have enough ground water for drinking but we need water for other purposes such as irrigation and so this is the time to be economical and regulate our use of water.”

Gupta points out that though the government is sanctioning enough money for new tube-wells in an effort at enhancing supply of water, it is the distribution system that is playing culprit, “Our distribution system is totally neglected. It is old and dates back to the 1930s and results in a lot of leakage and wastage. The Dilaram Water Works was set up on 1937 and our city is still expanding and lines are being dug almost daily. Time has now come for the state government to no longer provide water as a facility. Water must now be made a commodity,” avers Gupta. “Even the public will realize the value of water once they are required to pay,” he points out.

Harvest it
Indeed time is ripe now to go for scientific water harvesting such as roof top water use. But this, too, is a system on which we cannot depend solely.

Dr. V.N. Sharda, director, Central Soil Water Conservation Research and Training Institute (CSWCRT), states, “We can achieve the objective of efficient use of available water resources only with the active participation of all sections of society. The Government of India encourages participatory management. The objective is to find ways and means that are more efficient, more user-responsive and more environment-friendly. We must not only involve various governmental agencies but also the users and other state holders,”

Sharda particularly emphasises the importance of Command Area Development Programme. Under this, he explains, “One of the objective is to encourage farmers’ participation in construction activities such as land leveling and shaping, construction of field channels and equitable distribution of water among the farmers’ land holdings which are generally small.”

Policy study is already underway in Uttarakhand. A physical accounting of water resources is underway. This will be followed by demand estimates, development opportunities and finally the socio-economic factors conducive for the management of resources on sustainable basis involving the local community.

The Times of India (New Delhi), 22 March 2009

Our country gets about 4,000 billion cubic meters of water from the sky out of which only about one-fourth of this is actually usable, as the rest runs off into the sea. This quantum remains more or less constant, though there are regional variations subject to local landforms and rock structures. Whatever we could do for impounding water has been done to a large extent, there are about 4,500 large dams in our country and thousands of small water holding structures. Over the last century or so, India’s population has quadrupled. The average availability of usable water has correspondingly decreased from about 6000 cubic meter per capita per day to 1500 to 1800 meter per capita per day.

Unfortunately, in the last 4-5 decades owing to negligence and greed of ‘we’ the consumers, fresh water resources have witnessed a considerable decline in the water quality and quantity. The ever increasing groundwater depletion is a major threat to people. Studies have revealed that there is decrease of 1ft. to 4ft. annually in the ground water level. We have to stop being the victims of the vagaries of nature, it calls for tightening our belts and starting a mass revolution.

Rainwater harvesting
Some of the common queries that play on the minds of people are: What is rain water harvesting? Does it work? Can we harvest rain in our own house? Who benefits? What will be the quality of water? How much does it cost? To put it simply, rain water harvesting means catching and holding rain where it falls and using it. We can store it in tanks or can use it to recharge groundwater.

What is rainwater harvesting?
Rainwater is the purest form of water available on the earth. Rainwater harvesting is the process of gathering and storing rain drops and preventing runoff, evaporation and seepage for its efficient utilization and conservation. Rainwater harvesting is an effective tool option to gather the rain water and store it appropriately. Harvesting helps utilise a large quantity of good quality water which would other-wise go to waste creating several problems on the way. Rainwater harvesting is a simple, economical and eco-friendly technique of preserving every drop of water falling on the earth.

Our ancestors harvested rain just as naturally as they tilled the ground to grow crops. We lost touch with these local solutions. But now, as the taps dry up, more and more people are reviving this age-old system and practicing it very successfully. Structures to harvest rain requires little space. A dried bore well, a row of soak pits or a tank concealed below the ground are all that we need. The open spaces, rooftops and ground can be used as catchment (surface to catch rain) area. By this, our groundwater will be recharged, and as groundwater moves, our neighborhood will gain too. While doing it we have to be careful not to direct sewage water into it. Rain water is like distilled water. Water is in its purest form as rain, if we do not mix it with other contaminants. Cost is calculated based on the size of the building and various other considerations.

We have to realise the importance of conserving water and take it as our won responsibility to rectify the situation and not look towards the government for everything. It is so easy to sit comfortably in our homes and criticise others and the government for not doing anything. We have to awaken to the fact that we are the ones creating the problem so we should be the ones to solve it. Unless each and every one of us do our little bit the problem will worsen.

The Times of India (New Delhi), 22 March 2009

With water resources drying up fast due to increase in heat world over, called global warming, it has been estimated by the experts that by the year 2025 about one third of the world population would not have any access to any form of water. Only God knows how they will manage their affairs without water or will get water form some other source or in different form, as one cannot sustain without water.

Water is the lifeline of all human beings and out of all the natural resources it is most vital basic requirement for human survival, probably, next only to oxygen which we need to breathe. In human body nearly 70 per cent of the tissues consist of water which keep on evaporating every now and then and needs to be replenished depending upon the type of activities one does. Besides, the human requirement of water for it’s own survival it is required for domestic purposes for personal hygiene, cooking, washing, etc, it is required for agriculture, industry, commerce and other economic and construction purposes as 50 per cent of the raw materials consist of water. Like human beings, water is equally essential for flora and fauna to survive and, in fact, water is every body’s business.

In natural form, after melting of snows, water flows in rivers and streams and, they say, the flowing water does not get polluted by our day to day use. But it gets polluted when human flux or effluence of industries is put into it or the rain water carries with it the muck lying on ground in it’s way to rivers. The river water thus gets polluted with a variety of chemicals which prove harmful to health of those who consume that water untreated and suffer from different diseases. Chlorination kills majority of the bacteria but certain chemicals were detected in certain parts of the country which are affecting health of the people in those regions. It is not only human beings but plants and animals too need water and it affects their growth too if water loaded with toxic chemicals or harmful micro-organisms is supplied. Severe water pollution can kill large numbers of fish, birds and other animals and even specific species could be wiped out. Vegetation grown with polluted water at times have been seen to have developed bad smell and taste had proved harmful to had proved harmful to health. Even fish reared in polluted waters developed bad taste and affected health of those who consumed.

Even hazardous wastes when dumped very close to rivers/seas permeate certain chemicals into water and cause damage. In 1950, the residents of Minamata, in Japan, experienced unusual symptoms of numbness, vision problems, convulsions, etc. and several hundred people died due to mercury ingestion out of the chemicals dumped by a local industry. It poisoned fish and took years to clear the area of the contamination. Similar situation has been experienced in many towns world over and in our country where waste has been dumped very close to the sources of supply of water. Especially rivers and underground reservoirs. In those areas even in municipal taps and ‘hand pumps’ the water has been found to be contaminated and unfit for human consumption. The water where there is excess of metals or pesticides usually affect stomach, kidney and liver but excess of lead exposes children to mental retardation. The quality of drinking water needs to be checked very frequently to avoid such situations and where any such cases are reported or seen.

One has to be very careful in the use of chemical fertilizers and so also spray of pesticides on crops and even at homes to kill mosquitoes and cock-roaches which may fall on exposed articles especially eats…

Common waterborne diseases like diarrhea, jaundice, etc. are caused by bacteria either permeating through the above process or sucked in through leakages in pipes which run close to sewerage lines or are close to open garbage dumps. These should be immediately reported for repairs to water authorities. Not only these leakages effect water pressure but are a source of contamination of water.

Even underground water gets polluted if sewerage soaking pits are dug very close to it.

Water has already become a precious and scarce commodity but is being used in big cities and towns as a luxury and plenty of water is wasted without bothering that there is water shortage in many parts of the country to the extent that even water for drinking and cooking food in not available and govt. is finding difficult to provide. Some parts every year have droughts and some get floods as we had not been able to control the flow of water in monsoons, on which we are largely dependent and which cause floods and droughts. In order to remove the atrocities caused by those calamities every year a big project is needed with utmost attention but meanwhile what ever little help we can provided in the process of conserving water, we must take..

On one side we call water a precious commodity but on the other hand it is being supplied without meters and charged arbitrarily at increased rates as there is no state water regulatory commission who may fix rates correctly to be charged from the consumers. Consumers are suffering not only from erratic supply of water but the quantity being worked out and equally arbitrary rates. The theory of increasing rates to check consumption has no where worked especially in commodities which are essential. Water is being sold through water trolleys at exorbitant rates. Why can’t govt. establish regulatory commission, as done in electricity, to control rates and see how those are being worked out and the consumers feel satisfied as commission may listen to their views as well before deciding rates. One wonders at times if the Jal Sansthan has that much of water with them for which they are charging the public. Well some thing drastic needs to be done to stop this malpractice and restore confidence of the consumers.

About 160 litres of water is normally required daily per person for normal living but this much of quantity is generally not available in most of the towns in the country due to either shortage of water or old pipeline needing replacement for which sufficient funds are not there. In certain areas water is there but brackish and cannot be used for drinking but is good for cultivation.

As many as 203 of the 401 class II cities in India get less than 100 litres of water per person per day. In water scarcity hit Rajasthan 10 towns get water once in three days and in 31 towns once in two days and 12 towns get water by train from places 200 km away. Due to contaminated water there are over 100 million cases of diarrhoea and about 5 lakh children die of the disease. About 66 million people in 200 district face the risk of contaminated water with Flouride and 15 million of arsenic poisoning.

One of the ways to conserve water is to grow more trees, especially those varieties which have long life and are otherwise very useful to the society in many ways. Let the water be absorbed by the earth rather than allowing it to flow away as it may help in raising the under ground water storage. Try to conserve every drop of water as it may help posterity to preserve for more number of years. We remember and pray for the peace of our ancestors and now let us make a beginning to pray for the long life of our human posterity by simply saving wastage of water.

The Himachal Times (Dehradun), 23 March 2009

Many people in the developing world still perceive the discussions around climate change as one more imperialist attempt by developed countries to prevent growth of incomes in their own countries and achievement of decent living standards for the poor. While denial of this sort may be derided, such concerns are not entirely without basis. It is obvious that the developed industrial world has been responsible for most of the climate change effects, and now intends to prevent the developing world from repeating the same patterns. But what is disturbing is that this deeply unequal tendency persists even in the period of global slowdown.

Thus, the small minority of the world’s population that resides in developed countries consumes the bulk of the world’s resources and leaves gigantic carbon footprints, in per capita terms, that are many multiples of those created by the people of developing countries. It is commonplace to hear the argument that the rise of China and India is particularly damaging to the environment. But this misses one basic point: Even if the entire population of the developing world suddenly ceased to exist, production and consumption in the north alone would still be such as to accelerate the process of global warming and use up the globe’s natural resources rapidly.

So, all the negotiations around climate change that focus on “sharing the burden” or suggest passing the burden on to poor countries through a system of carbon credits, are misplaced, at least, to some extent. It has to be recognised that per capita carbon emissions and consumption of scarce natural resources among the population resident in the developed world must reduce — and that too, quite sharply — if any progress is to be achieved on this front.

On the other hand, consider what would be seen as the necessary minimum standard of living in the north: surely it would include adequate food, permanent shelter, electricity for lighting and running some basic appliances, basic healthcare and education. If the majority of the population of developing countries is to be brought even close to this minimum standard, it will necessarily require a substantial increase in carbon emissions.

But that does not mean that the current patterns of industrialisation and accumulation in the developing south are sustainable. Relatively small minorities of elite and middle class groups have dominated the process of economic growth across the world, especially in the past two decades. The large and growing inequalities within countries have meant that production has been disproportionately geared towards meeting the changing lifestyle requirements of the rich everywhere, rather than ensuring basic needs for all.

This means that coping with climate change also necessarily requires a reduction of income and wealth inequalities within countries. This is not going to be easy. It will require the global elite, spread across both developed and developing worlds, to curb extravagant lifestyles. It will require wage shares of national income to rise from their current very low proportions, with corresponding declines in the shares of profits and interest. It will require governments everywhere to be more responsive to the needs of the bulk of their citizenry rather than bow to the interests of a privileged minority.

But it will also mean that even among the less wealthy, the presumptions and aspirations of what constitutes a civilised life will have to be modified. The model popularised by “the American Dream” is perhaps the most dangerous in this context, with its emphasis on suburban residential communities far from places of work, markets and entertainment and linked only through private motorised transport.

This model is now being exported to countries in the developing world. So, as elites and middle class groups opt for the personal vehicle as the preferred transport option, public transport is underfunded and has becomes an unviable alternative.

Capitalist markets created this want and then proceeded to oversupply it: we now have substantial overcapacity in automobile production globally. And the automobile companies have, as a result, been among the first to be badly affected by the global economic slowdown. Yet in this period of crisis, much of the efforts of governments across the world, beginning with the US, is directed towards saving these automobile companies. The immediate fears about job losses, if some of these companies do shutdown, have completely overshadowed any questions on the long-run appropriateness of such production.

The issue involves moving beyond such palliatives as “green cars” that reduce carbon emissions, although that is obviously desirable. It requires a shift in the way we organise our societies, our locations, our lives.

Similar issues arise in many other sectors where the need is to move beyond technological change to changing the vector of final demands in ways that allow for more equitable and sustainable consumption across the world.

But, by any reckoning, there are other goods that clearly do deserve to be in the final demand of the entire population: for example, cooling and refrigerating agents in tropical or hot countries, or heating in very cold countries. There is also no reason why anyone in the world should be denied the benefits of new goods and services — such as communication possibilities — that can dramatically change the quality of life.

In this context, multilateral negotiations on climate change have been hugely disappointing, especially for the developing world because they have barely addressed the crucial issue of technology transfer. It is no surprise that new and green technologies are dominantly being developed in the north by large corporates — they have the resources and now even the fiscal incentives to do so. But the increasingly octopus-like grip of intellectual property rights denies producers in developing countries access to these technologies except under very onerous and typically monopolistic conditions. For any meaningful action on mitigating and adapting to climate change, democratic access to new technologies is absolutely essential. And with it, finance to enable producers in the developing world to adopt such technologies.

It is more than obvious now that unfettered markets are simply unequal to these complex and enormous tasks. Not only are they obsessed with short-run profitability, but the incentives thrown up by current relative prices all operate to direct production and consumption in precisely the opposite, unsustainable direction. So government intervention — within countries and spanning across countries in multilateral efforts — is absolutely essential. Fortunately for those who have been pointing to the need for government action for some time, the state is back in fashion in economic terms. The de facto nationalisation of banking in many important capitalist economies, the need for large firms to keep turning to governments for large bailouts and other props, the recognition that free cross-border trade often operates to worsen environmental damage — all these make the case for public policy much more persuasive.

The Asian Age (New Delhi), 3 March 2009

Terming the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) as a “historical responsibility”, India has urged the US not to “unilaterally” bring in a “new dimension” on mandatory emission cut for the developing countries.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s special envoy on climate change Shyam Saran said India is more than prepared to work with the US on the issue, whose newly elected President Barack Obama had spoken to Dr. Singh and informed him about his country’s willingness to work in “close partnership” with India.

India has also reiterated that global financial crisis should not become an excuse for developed countries to deviate from their commitment on green house gas emissions cuts.

The US, which although is signatory to the Kyoto Protocol, has not ratified it, has been demanding that all countries, including developing should have mandatory emission cut goals. The Kyoto Protocol is a protocol to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and has a “common but differentiated responsibility” approach.

“President Obama has brought in a renewed focus to this entire issue and his green budget is an example,” said Mr Saran.

He said that there is an impression created that India does not bring anything to the table on emission cut issue while other countries have submitted proposal. “These are distorted projection,” said Mr Saran, adding that adaptation measures against climate change are more important than mitigation measures.

India had last year announced a National Action Plan on Climate Change which primarily focus on sustainable development and optimum use of natural resources like the solar energy.

The prime minister’s special envoy said the eight missions under the national action plan are very close to finalisation and will be submitting the final draft soon.

Mr. Saran said India’s compulsion to bring down effects of climate change is much broader than reducing the levels of greenhouse gases.

He said India like other developing countries will want technology transfer. Developing countries have been demanding a fund for assisting them to bring in new technologies.

The Asian Age (New Delhi), 3 March 2009

As they do every December, world officials gathered in Poznan this time for the United Nations Conference on Climate Change. They had come to advance the negotiations for a post-2012 international agreement on climate change. Some 11,000 participants attended. It was quite an event. Nothing happened. Nothing much was expected to happen. With the US administration in transition at that time, significant progress on the negotiations was always unlikely. After an agreement on modalities for the adaptation fund, an instrument created to finance adaptation projects and programmes in developing countries, participants shook hands, promised to keep talking and headed home for the holidays.

The first real challenge for a post-2012 climate deal will come in the summer of 2009. The draft text on the agreement is supposed to be ready by then. The final challenge will come in Copenhagen in December 2009 where the agreement is scheduled to be finalised.

That meeting is supposed to be a milestone in the global response to climate change. In case the sense of history or suspense might elude you, the website of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change — the agency coordinating the global response — carries a foreboding clock in black with orange letters and numbers continuously counting down to the Copenhagen meeting. Countdown to Copenhagen, countdown to the fate of humanity.

The fault lines that have so far pervaded the post-2012 climate discussions are not just political rhetoric. They are real and, from India’s perspective, have meaningful long-term impact on its objectives for growth, development and poverty reduction.

As the fourth-largest greenhouse gas (GHG) emitter in the world, India has an important role to play in the global response to climate change. Consider this: If India were to meet existing electricity shortages with its current portfolio of power plants, the resulting emissions over a five-year period could erase the reductions that Japan is required to achieve in the five-year first commitment period under the Kyoto Protocol.

It is not just India that is involved. All larger developing countries will be important to the climate agreement. Several forecasts suggest that GHG emissions from developing countries will exceed that of developed countries by the middle of the next decade. An international framework that does not actively engage developing countries in the mitigation effort will be irrelevant. That’s exactly where the trouble begins.

The fear in India, as with other developing countries, is that reduction requirements on them will constrain economic growth. In a country where the bulb — even in the capital city — doesn’t turn on half the time because there is no electricity, the need for reductions will always seem misplaced.

The EU’s “Road to Copenhagen” communication released in late January envisions that developing countries should commit to implementing national low-carbon development strategies in all key sectors by 2011. The EU further urges developing countries to commit to overall reductions of 15-30 per cent from business as usual levels by 2020.

The emphasis on reduction commitments for developing countries detracts from a discussion on the challenges they face in meeting the dual objectives of growth and sustainability.

A low-carbon strategy involves the use of technology and financing. But that’s not enough. Translating the incentives of carbon markets into technology and financing requires a clear — and stable — policy framework. Some developed countries already have fiscal systems where incentives can reasonably be expected to yield desired outcomes. India doesn’t. Nor do most developing countries.

Consider India’s electricity industry as an illustration. The sector has struggled with three broad objectives: Access for all, reliable supply and growth to meet rising demand. These objectives, however, have remained elusive. The failures stemmed mainly from endemic system inefficiencies of state monopolies — failed state electricity boards, high commercial losses, structural and regulatory bottlenecks and payment uncertainty.

Two decades of sector reform efforts finally coalesced into the Electricity Act 2003 — a comprehensive set of regulatory and structural measures to liberalise and modernise the sector. The implementation has been patchy across the states but there are visible signs of success. Private participation has increased significantly. A stronger regulatory framework has evolved. Many state electricity boards have restructured. Most important, there are greater opportunities and increased certainty of returns. Everybody agrees that a robust electricity sector stands the only chance of delivering on the objectives of access, reliability and growth. The challenges in getting there are still far from over — the Electricity Act 2003 is the only the beginning.

Ecological sustainability has always been a component of the Electricity Act. For the power sector, low-carbon initiatives include better use of renewable generation, promotion of hydro, end-use energy efficiency, adoption of new technologies and improvements in existing performance.

The act included several of these objectives: A goal for generation from renewable energy; support to the Bureau of Energy Efficiency; renovation and modernisation initiatives for existing plants; better use of hydro resources; and incentives to reduce commercial and technical system losses. But incentives to achieve these are either patchy or weak.

If implemented successfully, these initiatives would significantly slow emission growth. Yet they languish in potential and promises. That’s because sector reforms are far from complete. The essential elements of the electricity supply chain — fuel supply on the one side and distribution on the other — are yet to attain a critical mass of reforms. In such a sector environment, how do you transform, for instance, the incentives for carbon abatement into achieving more renewable power? A meaningful response on climate change must, therefore, be framed differently. It should propose systematic incentives for increased energy diversification, more renewable energy on grids, or incentives for better performance — measures that promote emissions reductions while also supporting the broader sector reform agenda.

The EU’s “Road to Copenhagen” communication recognises the need for domestic sector environments that can support mitigation efforts in developing countries. The challenge for this community is how to make developing countries accountable. And they should be held accountable. But the answer cannot be in simple reduction commitments. Rather, developing countries should be held accountable for achieving energy and industrial carbon efficiencies, energy diversification or delivering on more renewable power in their grids — an overall target that is sure to expedite reform efforts in the power sector.

The challenge for governments in developing countries is to propose a climate framework that works both for economic growth and addresses climate change.

Promoting renewable energy generation is not a good thing just for climate change. It serves to increase access, ensure reliable supply and meet demand growth. These are our broader national objectives. Promoting energy efficiency lowers energy costs for business, frees up extra power, promotes innovation and eventually leads to the use of cleaner technologies. Getting a country like India a good deal in the post-2012 framework may not be about just getting a waiver on reduction commitments. It will be about putting in place an international framework that better supports the country’s national objectives of growth and poverty reduction; about strong and clear incentives, access to cleaner technologies, financing opportunities and new markets.

Understanding this reality can make the Copenhagen meeting the beginning of a new dawn rather than just another version of the old song and dance.

Business Standard (New Delhi), 3 March 2009

The plausible spectre of large numbers of people migrating from coastal regions, and of entire populations abandoning small island countries due to rising sea levels makes it vitally important for the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change to come up with a strong adaptation strategy at its Copenhagen conference later this year. The scale of the climate migration challenge is staggering. Experts estimate that by mid-century nearly 250 million people may come under pressure to move out because of intensifying monsoon flooding, desertification, and reduced food production. The threat of mass migration is of acute concern to India because, for a start, Bangladesh, where millions of people live close to the sea, is extremely vulnerable. Another neighbour, the Maldives, fears it will almost entirely go under water with a not-impossible one-metre rise in sea level. So gloomy is the view from the beautiful, atoll nation that its recently elected government announced a move to create a sovereign fund to resettle its population of about 300,000 abroad. It wants the world to treat climate change as a human rights issue. These developments should prompt India to take climate change more seriously than it has done so far.

The United Progressive Alliance government’s National Action Plan on Climate Change clearly lacks a sense of demonstrable urgency. The plan has been justly criticised for adhering to the old path of economic growth involving unsustainable energy intensity, and for abandoning equity principles. The poor feel the immediate effects of an altered climate. The Prime Minister’s special envoy on climate change, Shyam Saran, has indicated that the eight missions envisaged under the action plan are nearing finalisation, but it is obvious that they will remain on the back-burner until a new government assumes office in May. Numerous months have been lost in getting state governments to roll out key missions covering sustainable habitat, agriculture, green cover, water conservation, and public transport. The scientific view makes it clear that all major countries, including India, must cut emissions significantly. Leading climatologists think the safe level for global atmospheric carbon dioxide is 350 parts per million (ppm), but that level is history. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change recorded 379 ppm of the gas in 2005. Conventional coal-based power plants continue to be built everywhere and they are steadily ramping up emissions. Rhetoric will not serve India under these circumstances. It must show genuine intent and tangible action.

The Hindu (New Delhi), 7 March 2009

Until recently, the idea that the world’s most powerful nations might come together to tackle global warming seemed an environmentalist’s distant dream.

The Kyoto Protocol, signed in 1997, was widely viewed as flawed. Many countries that signed it lagged far behind their targets in curbing carbon dioxide emissions. The United States refused even to ratify it. And the treaty gave pass to major emitters in the developing world like China and India.

But within weeks of taking office, President Obama has radically shifted the global equation, placing the United States at the forefront of the international climate effort and raising hopes that an effective international accord might be possible. Mr. Obama’s Chief Climate Negotiator, Todd Stern, said in February that the United States would be involved “in a robust way” in the negotiation of a new treaty, to be signed in Copenhagen in December.

That treaty, officials and climate experts involved in the negotiations say, will significantly differ from the agreement of a decade ago, reaching beyond reducing greenhouse gas emissions and including financial mechanisms and making good on longstanding promises to provide money and technical assistance to help developing countries cope with climate change.

The perception that the United States is now serious has set off a flurry of diplomacy around the globe. “The lesson of Kyoto is that if the U.S. isn’t taking it seriously there is no reason for anyone else to,” said Bill McKibben, who runs the environmental organisation www.350.org

But a global treaty still faces serious challenges, and the negotiations will be test of how far the world is prepared to go to address climate change at a moment when economies are unspooling.

Thirty-seven developed countries, including Japan, Australia and nations in the European Union, ratified the Kyoto accord, agreeing to reduce or limit the growth of carbon dioxide emissions by specified amounts. President George W. Bush, pressed by the Senate, rejected the accord, because countries like China were not also subject to mandatory emission levels. China and India also refused to ratify the protocol.

Of the countries that signed, more than half are not on track to meet their targets according to 2008 United Nations data, including Germany, Ireland and Canada.

The talks on the new treaty, said Rajendra K. Pachauri, chairman of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, offer “an opportunity to fill this gap that we’ve seen, and this time perform up to expectations.”

Negotiating the treaty when countries are under extreme economic stress presents challenges, acknowledged Yvo de Boer, the top United Nations climate official. Politicians in Italy and Canada complain it will be difficult to clean up industries to meet their Kyoto goals because of the downturn. But others say an industrial recession, in which emissions tend to drop anyway and countries are poised to spend billions to stimulate economies, is the time to craft a global effort to combat global warming.

With developing countries like China and India emerging as major carbon dioxide emitters, experts said that if the new treaty was to be effective, every nation would have to accept emissions limits. “If one part of the world acts and the other does not, that doesn’t really generate a climate benefit,” Mr. De Boer said.

Developed countries would most likely get binding numerical targets, as some did in Kyoto. Developing counties, which were exempt under Kyoto, would probably be given less stringent goals.

Another complex issue is whether negotiators will retain the system of trading carbon credits that is central to the Kyoto Protocol, a kind of global commodities market for carbon. That system allows countries that produce more than their allotted share of emissions to balance their emissions budget by investing in projects that curtail emissions elsewhere.

But as the European Union and the countries that signed the Kyoto Protocol have tried such projects over the past few years, problems have emerged. Most notably, it is hard to determine the emissions-reducing value of carbon credit projects, making it easy to game the system.

Experts say the new treaty will also have to broaden Kyoto’s focus beyond industry to activities like air travel, one of the fastest-growing sources of emissions. “This is not just about emissions but about creating a massive investment in a new global energy economy” that includes forests, oceans and the transfer of technology, said Angela Anderson, director of the Pew Environment Group’s Global Warming Campaign.

The Asian Age (New Delhi), 7 March 2009

Though climate change will affect everyone the world over, it will affect the poor disproportionately. Women comprise about 70 per cent of people who live on less than $1 a day. Yet, most of the debate is gender-blind, says a new report by a research organisation based in the US.

It’ll, in turn, impact the fight against climate change because women’s leadership on climate change is critical. Women can help or hinder strategies related to energy use, deforestation, economic growth and science and technology among others, adds World Watch Institute in State of the World: Into a Warming World.

So, any climate management strategy requires that more attention be given to enhancing women’s capacity to manage climate risks and increase their opportunities for development. It can be done by improving their access to skills, education and knowledge; strengthening their ability to manage disasters; supporting their access to risk-management instruments; and helping households gain greater access to credit, markets and social security, explains the author.

Women are already taking a lead by themselves. In Kenya, the Green Belt Movement and the World Bank’s carbon fund have an emissions reduction agreement to reforest two mountain areas. About 3,50,000 tonne of carbon dioxide is expected to be captured this way.

The global community also took its first step in this direction by setting up the Global Gender and Climate Alliance (CGCA) at the UN climate change conference in Bali in December 2007. The alliance stands for integrating a gender perspective into global policymaking and decision making to ensure that UN financing mechanisms on mitigation and adaptation address the needs of poor women and men equitably.

The alliance also plans to set standards for incorporating gender equality and equity principles in climate change mitigation and adaptation strategies; and building capacities at all levels to design and implement gender responsive climate change policies, strategies, and programmes, says the report.

Going beyond these plans, various stakeholders need to get their act in order. The report lists a few steps in this direction. First, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) should incorporate the principles of gender equity and equality at all stages in post-2012 climate change negotiations. It is critical that UNFCCC takes necessary measures like investing in specialised research on gender and climate change, establishing a system of gender-sensitive indicators for its national reports and for planning adaptation strategies or projects under the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM).

Second, governments need to take action at regional, national, and local levels, including translating international agreements into domestic policies.

Third, all financial mechanisms and instruments associated with climate change should include mainstreaming of a gender perspective and women’s empowerment. For example, explains the author, climate change adaptation funds could guarantee the incorporation of gender considerations and implementation of initiatives that meet women’s needs. Women could also be included in all levels of the design, implementation, and evaluation of afforestation and reforestation that receive payments for environmental services, such as carbon sinks.

Besides, women should have access to commercial carbon funds, credits, and information that enable them to understand and decide which new resources and technologies meet their needs. Finally, the CDM should finance projects that bring renewable energy technologies within the reach of women to help meet their domestic needs

The Financial Express (New Delhi), 9 March 2009

Dehradun will join Delhi and Mumbai in the WWF-India Earth Hour global campaign aimed at sensitising people about climate change. The campaign (Earth Hour) is a “lights out” initiative and is an appeal to the residents of Dehradun to keep their lights off from 8.30 pm to 9.30 pm on March 28.

Jitendra Singh Rawat, education officer, WWF Dehradun Field Office, who has been heading preparations for the campaign here said that schools here have already given their consent to join the campaign.

“We have met the head of various boarding schools and they too have pledged to keep their lights off,” Rawat added.

Various central government offices institutions like the Forest Research Institute and Wildlife Institute and business houses have also been approached by the WWF soliciting their support.

The “lights out” initiative, which began in Sydney in 2007 as a one-city environmental campaign, has evolved into a grassroots action that has captured the attention of citizens around the world. In 2008, 371 cities across 35 countries had turned their lights off.

Now, with almost few weeks still remaining before Earth Hour 2009, that number has already been eclipsed. Over 377 cities, including Delhi and Mumbai, across 74 countries have now committed to turning off their lights on March 28.

Welcoming the initiative, climate change scientist Dr. V.R.S. Rawat said global warming is a huge threat and asserted that people need to be made aware of it.

The Tribune (Chandigarh), 10 March 2009

One of the stranger spectacles of the climate change debate was the sight, earlier this month, of NASA climate scientist Jim Hansen marching hand-in-hand with Hollywood actress Darryl Hannah outside the Capitol Coal Power Plant in Washington, D.C. Hansen promised to brave arrest at what was billed as the world's largest direct-action climate change protest. Instead, the worst snowstorm in three years reduced the size of the crowd, prevented special guests from arriving, and hindered efforts to use a solar panel to light up a protest billboard. The police reportedly told the crowd that they didn't want to arrest anybody who didn't want to be arrested, and nobody was.

That didn't stop the protesters from proclaiming the event a success.

But if stopping global warming were this easy, I ? and everybody I know ? would be painting placards for the next round of direct action.

Hansen condemns coal-fired power plants as “death factories,” and his belief that coal is evil is widely shared. It is also obviously wrong. If we were to stop using coal tomorrow, we would discover that it remains a vital source of life. Coal accounts for almost half of the planet's electricity supply, including half the power consumed in the United States. Coal keeps hospitals and core infrastructure running, provides warmth and light in winter, and makes life-saving air conditioning available in summer. In China and India, where coal accounts for about 80 per cent of power generation, it has helped to lift hundreds of millions of people out of poverty.

It is little wonder, then, that U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu, who two years ago described the expansion of coal-fired power plants as his “worst nightmare," now calls coal a “great natural resource."

The vital question is what would replace coal if were to stop using it. Judging from their chant ? “No coal, no gas, no nukes, no kidding" and “Biofuels ? hell no!" ? the protesters in Washington would rule out many plausible alternatives.

Solar and wind power appear to be acceptable, but both are much less reliable than coal, and much more expensive. Only about 0.5 per cent of the world's energy comes from these renewable sources.

Even with optimistic assumptions, the International Energy Agency estimates that their share will rise to just 2.8 per cent by 2030. One reason is that we don't know how to store the energy from these sources: when the wind doesn't blow and the sun doesn't shine, what powers your computer or the hospital's operating room?

Moreover, renewables are still costly. Recently, former U.S. Vice President Al Gore and United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon claimed that, in the U.S., there are now more jobs in the wind industry than in the entire coal industry." Never mind that the numbers were massaged, because they still hold a valuable lesson. The U.S. gets 50 per cent of its electricity from coal but less than 0.5 per cent from wind. If it takes about the same manpower to produce both, wind power is phenomenally more expensive.

The equivalent of more than 60 million barrels of oil is consumed in coal every day, and there is no affordable ``green" alternative. There is an ample and cheap supply of coal for several centuries. We need to accept that much of the world's cheap coal will be burned ? but we should focus on capturing the CO2. In agreements announced by the Obama administration, the U.S. is working with China and Canada on projects to develop this technology.

The end of fossil fuel's stronghold will come when we have cheap alternatives, especially in developing countries. That day will arrive sooner if governments spend a lot more money on low-carbon energy research, which is woefully inadequate. Every nation should ideally commit to spending 0.05 per cent of GDP exploring non-carbon-emitting energy technologies. This would cost $25 billion per year ? a 10-fold increase in global financing ? and create momentum to recapture the vision of delivering a low-carbon, high-income world.

Coal contributes strongly to global warming, but no amount of political theater can alter the inescapable fact that it also provides benefits that we cannot yet replicate with renewable energy. Braving arrest with Hollywood stars is a diversion. Declaring true victory over global warming will take a lot more pragmatism, and a lot more work.

The Economic Times (New Delhi), 16 March 2009

We need to understand that we are part of the environment. We may consider ourselves to be a superior race in the evolution hierarchy, but we are not. We have used our intelligence and ingenuity to create chemicals, radioactivity, biological weapons and genetically-modified organisms with a minimal understanding of what impact these will have on the world or on us. We assume that technology will solve our problems without realising that technology is actually responsible for many of our problems. And while millions of human beings are starving or living in subsistence and inhuman conditions, there is a privileged minority which still feels that it can continue to live a life of profligate consumption without worrying about what this is doing to our planet. The fact that we have far exceeded carrying capacity of our planet is something that is not even the cause of worry for the decision-makers of our country.

Let us look at the issue of climate change. The first Government of India document to express some concern about climate change from an environmental perspective was the Coastal Regulation Zone (CRZ) Notification. The first draft notification that was issued in 1989, accepted the fact that climate change was happening and that areas that were likely to be submerged as a result of climate change would have to be zoned as CRZI (where no development would be allowed).

Today, every person is aware that climate change has actually started to change our world. Our weather patterns are changing. Our glaciers are receding, our icecaps are melting and extreme climate events are occurring with greater intensity. Sea levels are rising.

I live in coastal city Mumbai, along with 12 million other Mumbaikars. If you talk to most Mumbaikars about climate change, the fact that Mumbai will be submerged a few decades down the line has not occurred to them. Certainly it has not occurred to the ministers who are in Mantralaya, MMRDA and MCGM. How else can you explain the intention of the state government, MMRDA and MCGM to spend Rs. 3,00,000 crores or Rs. 3,000 billion in developing the infrastructure of Mumbai. For whom do they plan to develop the city if the city gets submerged in water?

Let sanity dawn on us. The change that we need is to educate ourselves to what these power holders are doing to our lives and the lives of future generations and let us hold them accountable.

The Asian Age (New Delhi), 16 March 2009

India today strongly hit out at developed nations for putting “conditions” and “adding dimension” such as carbon tariff and trade competitiveness for action on climate change.

“Action on climate change cannot be based on conditions. Once we start going in that direction, it means we start going for protectionism under green label and it is harmful to India’s interest-seeking sustainable development,” Shyam Saran, India’s special envoy on climate change said.

He was speaking at a Seminar on Business Response to Climate Change organised by the CII-ITC Centre of Excellence for Sustainable Development.

“So in that context, we see issues coming up, sometimes in the form of carbon tariff or greater tariff change or opening up of markets which the developed countries want to impose on us on the pretext of tackling climate change,” Saran added.

Sharing the concern of corporates that imposition of carbon tariff would go against the interest of business and industry here, he said "this is what we have been resisting. Collaborations become irrelevant when competitive tendencies prevail.”

“In international negotiations, we have taken the position that climate change is a challenge which must be dealt on its own and through supportive global regime,” he said, while indicating India’s stand to be taken at Copenhagen at the end of the year, when countries will meet to discuss a global policy on climate change.

“And whatever global action is taken must be based on the principles already incorporated in the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), which seek greenhouse gas emission cuts by the parties in Annexure I (developed nations),” he said.

Noting that climate change was not due to the current level of GHG (greenhouse gases) emissions but mainly due to the result of carbon-based industrial activity, he said that UNFCCC stipulates deep and significant cuts in the emissions of industrialised countries as fulfilment of their historic responsibility.

However, the developed nations are seeking to project that India is resisting the setting of a specific emissions cut target on a global basis, he said.

Positioning India’s National Action Plan on Climate Change as a new strategy for sustainable development, Saran said the issue of climate change for India is closely linked to development.

Business Standard (New Delhi), 17 March 2009

The climate change talks that are to be held in Bonn, Germany, towards the end of March and the first week of April are extremely important given that the deadline for negotiating a new treaty to replace the Kyoto Protocol is fast approaching. This conference is going to be one of the most important conferences to be held this year in preparation of a new climate change treaty to be decided upon in Copenhagen, Denmark, in December. With the Kyoto Protocol about to expire in 2012, there is an urgent need to settle new carbon emission reduction norms, something towards which little progress has been made so far. The latest climate talks that were held in Poznan in December were supposed to carry forward the discussions that took place in Bali in 2007. But this did not happen because the talks were overshadowed by the global recession with which the world has been preoccupied. There was also the election of a new president in United States and the Obama Administration was yet to fully define its perspective on climate change. Former President George W. Bush had opposed the Kyoto Protocol and had insisted that developing countries be held to the same standards as the US as far as emission cuts were concerned. Though President Obama has been committed to reducing greenhouse gas emissions in the US, he is yet to convince the European Union and other countries that his administration is serious about tackling climate change. The developing countries, in particular, have been disappointed with the US stand because climate change is a phenomenon for which the developed countries have been largely responsible. Though many developed European countries are willing to reduce their carbon emissions but there are still differences between them.

It is important for the world to settle the various issues holding up the climate change talks because global warming may be taking place at a swifter pace than initially thought. The latest reports indicate that ice sheets in the Artic Ocean may be melting at a rate far faster than earlier thought. In fact, the report of the World Wide Fund for Nature released a few months ago has indicated that the summer sea ice in the Arctic Ocean could completely disappear between 2013 and 2040, which could lead to a disastrous rise in sea level. Scientists have warned that unless earnest measures are taken within the next few year tackle climate change, the consequence could be catastrophic. The situation appears more serious than what was suggested by the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in 2007, which had predicted dismal consequences. Therefore, it is absolutely crucial that the talks in Bonn are a success and pave the way for the evolution of a new treaty on climate change.

The Pioneer (Dehradun), 17 March 2009

Quietly in public, loudly in private, climate scientists everywhere are saying the same thing: it’s over. The years in which more than 2oCelcius of global warming could have been prevented have passed, the opportunities squandered by denial and delay. On current trajectories we’ll be lucky to get away with 4oCelcius. Mitigation (limiting greenhouse gas pollution) has failed; now we must adapt to what nature sends our way. If we can.

This, at any rate, was the repeated whisper at the climate change conference in Copenhagen last week. It’s more or less what Bob Watson, the environment department’s chief scientific adviser, has been telling the British government. It is the obvious if unspoken conclusion of scores of scientific papers. Recent work by scientists at the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research, for instance, suggests that even global cuts of 3 per cent a year, starting in 2020, could leave us with 4oCelcius of warming by the end of the century. At the moment, emissions are heading in the opposite direction at roughly the same rate. If this continues, what does it mean? Six? Eight? Ten degrees? Who knows?

Faced with such figures, I can’t blame anyone for throwing up their hands. But before you succumb to this fatalism, let me talk you through the options.

Yes, it is true that mitigation has so far failed. Sabotaged by Clinton, abandoned by Bush, attended halfheartedly by the other rich nations, the global climate talks have so far been a total failure. The targets they have set bear no relation to the science and are negated anyway by loopholes and false accounting. Nations like the U.K., which is meeting its obligations under the Kyoto Protocol, have succeeded only by outsourcing their pollution to other countries. And nations like Canada, which is flouting its obligations, face no meaningful sanctions.

Lord Stern made it too easy: he appears to have underestimated the costs of mitigation. As the professor of energy policy Dieter Helm has shown, Stern’s assumption that our consumption can continue to grow while our emissions fall is implausible. To have any hope of making substantial cuts we have both to reduce our consumption and transfer resources to countries like China to pay for the switch to low carbon technologies. As Helm notes, “there is not much in the study of human nature — and indeed human biology — to give support to the optimist.”

But we cannot abandon mitigation unless we have a better option. We don’t. If you think our attempts to prevent emissions are futile, take a look at our efforts to adapt.

Where Stern appears to be correct is in proposing that the costs of stopping climate breakdown, great as they would be, are far lower than the costs of living with it. Germany is spending €600m just on a new sea wall for Hamburg — and this money was committed before the news came through that sea-level rises this century could be two or three times as great as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has predicted. The Netherlands will spend €2.2bn on dykes between now and 2015; again they are likely to be inadequate. The U.N. suggests that rich countries should be transferring $50 to $75bn a year to poor ones now to help them cope with climate change, with a massive increase later on. But nothing like this is happening.

A Guardian newspaper investigation reveals that the rich nations have promised $18bn to help the poor nations adapt to climate change over the last seven years, but they have disbursed only 5 per cent of that money. Much of it has been transferred from foreign aid budgets anyway: a net gain for the poor of nothing. Oxfam has made a compelling case for how adaptation should be funded: nations should pay according to the amount of carbon they produce per capita, coupled with their position on the human development index. On this basis, the U.S. should supply more than 40 per cent of the money and the European Union over 30 per cent, with Japan, Canada, Australia and Korea making up the balance. But what are the chances of getting them to cough up?

There’s a limit to what this money could buy anyway. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change says that “global mean temperature changes greater than 4oCelcius above 1990-2000 levels” would “exceed ... the adaptive capacity of many systems.” At this point there’s nothing you can do, for instance, to prevent the loss of ecosystems, the melting of glaciers and the disintegration of major ice sheets. Elsewhere it spells out the consequences more starkly: global food production, it says, is “very likely to decrease above about 3oCelcius.” Buy your way out of that.

And it doesn’t stop there. The IPCC also finds that, above 3oCelcius of warming, the world’s vegetation will become “a net source of carbon.” This is just one of the climate feedbacks triggered by a high level of warming. Four degrees might take us inexorably to 5oCelcius or 6oCelcius: the end — for humans — of just about everything.

Until recently, scientists spoke of carbon concentrations — and temperatures — peaking and then falling back. But a recent paper in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences shows that “climate change is largely irreversible for 1,000 years after emissions stop.” Even if we were to cut carbon emissions to zero today, by the year 3000 our contribution to atmospheric concentrations would decline by just 40 per cent. High temperatures would remain more or less constant until then. If we produce it, we’re stuck with it.

In the rich nations we will muddle through, for a few generations, and spend nearly everything we have on coping. But where the money is needed most there will be nothing. The ecological debt the rich world owes to the poor will never be discharged, just as it has never accepted that it should offer reparations for the slave trade and for the pillage of gold, silver, rubber, sugar and all the other commodities taken without due payment from its colonies. Finding the political will for crash cuts in carbon production is improbable. But finding the political will — when the disasters have already begun — to spend adaptation money on poor nations rather than on ourselves will be impossible.

The world won’t adapt and can’t adapt: the only adaptive response to a global shortage of food is starvation. Of the two strategies it is mitigation, not adaptation, which turns out to be the most feasible option, even if this stretches the concept of feasibility to the limits. As Dieter Helm points out, the action required today is unlikely but “not impossible. It is a matter ultimately of human wellbeing and ethics.” Yes, it might already be too late — even if we reduced emissions to zero tomorrow — to prevent more than 2oCelcius of warming; but we cannot behave as if it is, for in doing so we make the prediction come true. Tough as this fight may be, improbable as success might seem, we cannot afford to surrender.

The Hindu (New Delhi), 18 March 2009

There have been far too many comparisons of the current recession with the one of 1929 and the reading of wrong lessons from that episode. But there is one aspect of what happened in that period which could prove quite useful this time around too. The Great Depression was cured to a significant extent by the onset of the Second World War that pulled massive number of industries in the US and Europe from out of their downward spiral.

This time that role would be played not by a conventional war, but the agenda for climate change. This has not happened yet but one is inclined to believe that this is going to happen sooner rather than later.

At present the governments of all countries working on fiscal stimuli are pouring it down on industries to produce cars that no one wants, flat screen TVs that are passé and water guzzling washing machines that are just not catching the attention of the consumers any more.

What we need instead is for spending to adapt to, and in fact create, the need for climate changing technology that can create a massive spin off in employment, establish new industry and create global enthusiasm to redefine lifestyles for this century. But that does not mean pandering to the Luddite back-to-basics environmental agenda. It has nothing in common with the green lobby that has often gone haywire. Instead it is a plan to invest massively in technologies many of which may be very far out, but because of the downturn have offered a wonderful chance to experiment at very competitive costs. Like any given set of investments, these would produce returns on a global scale and will create huge employment opportunities. Unfortunately, the investment on climate change technology has rapidly gone down by as much as 30 per cent from the levels of 2007 after the global crisis began.

Still, the harbingers are there. This year the Delhi Government has banned all plastic bags that cannot be recycled. It was a very big change as markets across Delhi have actually struggled but put in place an alternative system of carry bags. Since Delhi, like other Indian cities, sees more people take away food rather than eat in shops, the impact of the change was drastic. But the initiative is holding up, and a key component of that has been the impetus that climate friendly bags got. In a quick span of couple of months the demand for these bags has soared and as a bulk of their manufacturers are in the small sector, the growth potential has become substantial. Remember we are talking about high growth and rising employment at a time when these have almost vanished from most sectors.

At a more national level the Central Electricity Regulatory Commission is planning to release draft guidelines next month to make viable, solar energy as a source of electricity. At present the cost of generating per unit of solar energy is Rs.17. To bring the tariff to a comparable band of Rs. 2 or Rs. 3 per unit, some level of government support is necessary. It costs about Rs. 5 crore to develop a megawatt of solar energy and given the projection of generating about 2500 mw from here means an investment of about Rs. 12,500 crore by the private sector. Incidentally solar energy will also need the development of semi conductor chips as the backbone of the transmission network.

Attempts like these now need replication on massive scales and adaptation of rules in economies to make them commercially viable. Just as the Second World War was projected by the allied powers as a cause worth fighting for and therefore spending billions over, climate change technologies will hold a similar attraction at this stage. The sense of déjà vu that will accompany a fiscal programme that simply attempts to recreate the past models of success can be effectively countered through a global level of investment in the climate agenda.

It is complex though. For instance, where does one draw the line between helping out a company that is manufacturing products which are not very exciting from the climate agenda but have a massive employment spin off versus channelling investment into so far unproven technology. This will confront the decision making ability of the best governments. But so did the challenge of the last war. In fact it was the agenda of that war that spurred developments in nuclear energy, computers, radars and the jet planes among so many things.

What will this mean for countries like India? After the onset of the global crisis, the rancour between India and China on the one hand against the EU on the topic of global warming has eased substantially. This means the incessant battle to justify our growth rate against a supposedly global necessity to counter global warming has abated. So, now is the time for India to develop a consciously thought out set of policies that will give a big fillip to entrepreneurship to develop environmentally sustainable products at the mass level. The expanding production of carry bags or the fillip to solar energy are just two of many. The global justification and the timing are both there.

The Financial Express (New Delhi), 21 March 2009

There is almost a pattern to the way India’s environmental laws are formulated. Unusual secrecy surrounds the exercise and environmental watchdogs (research institutes, non-profit organisations and green activists) scurry from pillar to post seeking information on the proposed regulations or changes in existing laws and notifications. A spate of Right to Information (RTI) appeals are then filed with the Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF), which (reluctantly) puts up the notifications for responses from the public that are seldom taken note of.

The latest move to amend the Environment Impact Assessment (EIA) Notification of September 2006, itself a dilution of the 1994 EIA Notification, makes a mockery of safeguarding the environment from the depredations of development. The sweeping changes in the notification were put up on the ministry’s website only on January 19 this year although the Kalpavriksh Environmental Action Group of Delhi, an advocacy group, has been seeking information on these proposals since February 2008. The ministry’s defence was that it was an evolving process and could not be made public till the proposals had been finalised.

There is good reason why the MoEF chose to keep the proposals under wraps; the changes are stunning. The most egregious of the proposals is to exempt modernisation and expansion of projects from environmental scrutiny through a process of self-certification. Proponents of the project simply have to certify that there is no increase in the pollution load. This carte blanche to industries which are expanding or modernising less by than 50 per cent of their capacity defies logic since there is an implicit assumption that no additional natural resources will be required for the ramp-up and that it will have no impact on the environment. The MoEF has clearly capitulated to industry lobbies, especially, FICCI, which has been campaigning for self-certification by the industry by 2010. In this instance, it appears that the ministry is only too happy to oblige by making a start with expansion and modernisation.

In any case, compliance by highly-polluting industries is not being monitored, nor is any worthwhile attempt being made to assess the impact of their current operation on the environment. As it is, several projects are expanding merrily despite blatant non-compliance or incomplete EIAs. So is the MoEF merely legitimising a situation that it is unwilling or unable to tackle?

Many of the processes are even now deeply flawed although the MoEF chooses to ignore the lapses in granting clearances to major industries. Take for instance, the controversy surrounding the clearance give to the 1.75 million tonnes per annum integrated steel plant of Monnet Ispat Energy Ltd which includes a 240 Mw thermal power plant. The project, in Chhattisgarh’s Raigarh district, was cleared by MoEF on December 26, 2007 although the public hearing was not completed, according to local residents. The clearance was challenged by Jan Chetana, an organisation formed by the local population to safeguard their environment, at the National Environmental Appellate Authority (NEAA).

The appeal filed by Jan Chetana listed several illegalities. For one, the public hearing was postponed by the district collector because the EIA consultant to the company was unable to furnish details that were sought at the public hearing. The hearing was not held again, however. For another, work on the project was carried out in full swing without even environmental clearance granted to the project. Jan Chetana had initially asked the Chhattisgarh Environment Conservation Board (CECB) to cancel the public hearing scheduled for August 4, 2007 because the company had been repeatedly violating the provisions of environmental laws on account of which the CECB had filed a criminal complaint against Monnet Ispat in the Chief Judicial Magistrate’s court in Raigarh on April 7, 2007. For repeated violations of the laws, including the EIA Notification of 2006, another criminal complaint had been filed on July 20, 2007.

Yet, the company had commenced work on the project without several clearances, according to the Jan Chetana appeal filed by one its members Ramesh Aggarwal. The NEAA gave short shrift to the appeal by saying Jan Chetana had not been able to prove that it was an association and as such was not qualified to file an appeal!

Given this background, there is a deep sense of foreboding over the proposed amendments which are expected to be notified immediately after the parliamentary elections. But no one doubts the government’s rationale for driving the changes. The sheer numbers give the game away. Between September 2006 and August 2008, MoEF granted clearance to 2019 projects, an average of 85 projects a month. In contrast, only 25 projects have either been rejected or sent back for review/reconsideration. Compare this with the record of the ministry between 1986 and 2006: Just 4,016 projects cleared! Kalpavriksh, which secured these figures through an RTI petition, says the massive increase in the rate of clearances has “gone hand in hand with less time available to members of the Expert Assessment Committees to scrutinise each project and take a considered view on it”.

Another cause for concern is the move to tinker with the process of public consultation. MoEF has proposed that if the state pollution control boards fail to hold the public hearing within the stipulated 45 days, the project proponent can engage any other agency or authority to complete the process. “The solution is not to engage alternative authorities but to address the reasons which are causing the delay. Allowing the project proponent to hold a public consultation on the environmental impacts of their own project will not make for a free and fair consultation process,” warns Manju Menon of Kalpavriksh. “It is unfortunate that the MoEF fails to provide similar space to locally affected people who have no recommendatory or decision-making role.”

Given the unfair nature of the notification which is being tilted exponentially in favour of industry, some activists have sought the scrapping of the 2006 notification altogether and a new law be formulated in its place directly under the aegis of Parliament as with the Forest Rights Act. “EIA 2006 is a fit case for repealing,” insists Leo Saldanha of the Bangalore-based Environment Support Group (ESG), an independent public interest research institution. ESG had predicted that State Environment Impact Assessment Authorities and State Expert Assessment Committees would not be set up by the states, and as a result it could lead to the collapse of the clearance systems. Even if these state-level bodies had been set up, the lack of competency and the confounding nature of the procedures involved in the legislation would have had the same result.

Even those who are not activists agree with this analysis. Environmentalist lawyer Videh Upadhyay who has represented governments and companies, too, finds that in the guise of rationalising cumbersome procedures, the MoEF has perpetuated the logic of the 2006 notification. Everything is aimed at speeding up clearances, he warns. “There is no way you justify these amendments. The MoEF is mandated to protect the environment. Instead, it has let down the country.” As Upadhyay views it, this s a clear case of breach of trust and the ministry should be hauled up for it.

Business Standard (New Delhi), 4 April 2009

With his “Chipko” movement in Tehri ensuring a complete ban of felling of trees; Sunder Lal Bahuguna says environment is yet to emerge as an important political issue, resulting in a complete go by to environmental safeguards in development process.

Bahuguna has now throw his might behind the Himalaya Niti Abhiyan, a group of about two dozen action committees from Himachal who are protesting against displacement of people due to the coming up of power projects, cement plants, SEZ and ski village. He is here to attend the Himalaya Bachao campaign and pledge his support to those fighting for sustainable development.

“Political parties will try to intimidate you and in case that fails they will try to buy your vote with some notes and this is what one has to guard against,” he says, sounding a note of caution to the people fighting to protect their livelihood. He hastens to add that though people are realizing the relevance of protecting environment but a mass awakening in this regard is yet to come.

He says the fact that people still do not realise the importance of protecting environment is the reason why anybody stressing on the issue cannot win elections.

“The eight –year-old Chipko agitation was not easy as women sat in the forests through the night as the authorities brought Nepalese labour to continue work but then the people did not give up the struggle which ultimately was fruitful,” he says. He says it is fight that people have to fight not just for their own survival but for the next generations.

Holding a copy of the declaration of the Save Himalaya Movement he launched in the Tehri area of Uttrakhand in 1992, he says though both Himachal and his home state have imposed a complete ban on felling of trees but mining is still causing irreparable damage to the ecology.

He says it is imperative to strike a balance between development and environment and this is just not possible if one’s gain is another person’s loss. “It is a crime that the authorities are doing by damaging the fragile Himalayan ecology in the name of development,” he asserts.

The Tribune (Chandigarh), 11 April 2009

Global warming will set back the recovery of the ozone layer of the earth’s atmosphere, warns a NASA study. Previous studies have shown that while the build up of greenhouse gases makes it warmer in the troposphere, up to 10 km high from sea level, these gases actually cool the upper stratosphere, between 30 to 50 km high.

This cooling slows the chemical reactions that deplete ozone in the upper stratosphere and allows natural ozone production in that region to outpace destruction of the ozone layer by chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs).

But the accumulation of greenhouse gases also changes the circulation of stratospheric air masses from the tropics to the poles, NASA scientists note.

In the earth’s middle latitudes, that means ozone is likely to “over-recover”, growing to concentrations higher than they were before the mass production of CFCs. In the tropics, stratospheric circulation changes could prevent the ozone layer from fully recovering.

“Most studies of ozone and global change have focussed on cooling in the upper stratosphere,” said Feng Li, atmospheric scientist at the University of Maryland, Baltimore, and co-author of the study. “But we find circulation is just as important. It’s not one process or the other, but both.”

The findings are based on a detailed computer model that includes atmospheric chemical effects, wind changes and solar radiation changes, said a Maryland university release. These findings were published in the March edition of Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics.

The Asian Age (New Delhi), 13 April 2009

It’s hard to believe that this is what’s melting the glaciers,” said Dr. Veerabhadran Ramanathan, one of the world’s leading climate scientists, as he weaved through a warren of mud brick huts, each containing a mud cookstove pouring soot into the atmosphere.

As women in ragged saris of a thousand hues bake bread and stew lentils in the early evening over fires fuelled by twigs and dung, children cough from the dense smoke that fills their homes. Black grime coats the undersides of thatched roofs. At dawn, a brown cloud stretches over the landscape like a diaphanous dirty blanket.

In Kohlua, in central India, with no cars and little electricity, emissions of carbon dioxide, the main heat-trapping gas linked to global warming, are near zero. But soot — also known as black carbon — from tens of thousands of villages like this one in developing countries is emerging as a major and previously unappreciated source of global climate change.

While carbon dioxide may be the No. 1 contributor to rising global temperatures, scientists say, black carbon has emerged as an important No. 2, with recent studies estimating that it is responsible for 18 per cent of the planet’s warming, compared with 40 per cent for carbon dioxide. Decreasing black carbon emissions would be a relatively cheap way to significantly rein in global warming — especially in the short term, climate experts say. Replacing primitive cooking stoves with modern versions that emit far less soot could provide a much-needed stopgap, while nations struggle with the more difficult task of enacting programs and developing technologies to curb carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels.

In fact, reducing black carbon is one of a number of relatively quick and simple climate fixes using existing technologies — often called “low hanging fruit” — that scientists say should be plucked immediately to avert the worst projected consequences of global warming. “It is clear to any person who cares about climate change that this will have a huge impact on the global environment,” said Dr. Ramanathan, a professor of climate science at the Scripps Institute of Oceanography, who is working with the Energy and Resources Institute in New Delhi on a project to help poor families acquire new stoves.

“In terms of climate change we’re driving fast toward a cliff, and this could buy us time,” said Dr. Ramanathan, who left India 40 years ago but returned to his native land for the project. Better still, decreasing soot could have a rapid effect. Unlike carbon dioxide, which lingers in the atmosphere for years, soot stays there for a few weeks. Converting to low-soot cookstoves would remove the warming effects of black carbon quickly, while shutting a coal plant takes years to substantially reduce global CO2 concentrations.

But the awareness of black carbon’s role in climate change has come so recently that it was not even mentioned as a warming agent in the 2007 summary report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change that pronounced the evidence for global warming to be “unequivocal.” Mark Z. Jacobson, professor of environmental engineering at Stanford, said that the fact that black carbon was not included in international climate efforts was “bizarre,” but “partly reflects how new the idea is.” The United Nations is trying to figure out how to include black carbon in climate change programs, as is the federal government.

In Asia and Africa, cookstoves produce the bulk of black carbon, although it also emanates from diesel engines and coal plants there. In the United States and Europe, black carbon emissions have already been reduced significantly by filters and scrubbers. Like tiny heat-absorbing black sweaters, soot particles warm the air and melt the ice by absorbing the Sun’s heat when they settle on glaciers. One recent study estimated that black carbon might account for as much as half of Arctic warming. While the particles tend to settle over time and do not have the global reach of greenhouse gases, they do travel, scientists now realise.

In March, the cookstove project, called Surya, began “market testing” six alternative cookers in villages, in part to quantify their benefits.

The Asian Age (New Delhi), 20 April 2009

Investments of $750 billion could create a Green New Deal to revive the world economy and protect the environment, perhaps aided by a tax on oil, the executive director of the UN environment agency said last week.

Achim Steiner said such spending should focus on five environmental sectors, including improved energy efficiency for buildings and solar or wind power to create jobs, curb poverty and fight climate change.

The opportunity must not be lost, Steiner, head of the UN Environment Programme (UNEP), told Reuters of a UNEP study that will be put to world leaders meeting in London on April 2 to work out how to spur the ailing economy.

The UNEP report said investments of one per cent of global gross domestic product, or about $750 billion, could bankroll a Global Green New Deal inspired by the New Deal of US President Franklin D. Roosevelt that helped end the depression of the 1930s.

Investments should be split between more energy efficient buildings, renewable energies, better transport, improved agriculture and measures to safeguard nature—such as fresh water, forests or coral reefs, it said.

The study adds details of spending after UNEP called for a Green New Deal late last year.

Steiner also said that the world urgently needed funds to jump start a United Nations deal to fight global warming, due to be agreed in Copenhagen in December to succeed the UN’s Kyoto Protocol beyond 2012.

He floated the possibility of taxing oil in rich nations of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) to help a new pact become the cornerstone of a greener economy.

If, for argument’s sake, you were to put a five-year levy in OECD countries of $5 a barrel, you would generate $100 billion per annum. It translates into roughly 3 cents per litre, he said. Unnoticed

It would be almost, if not totally, unnoticed by the consumer, the UNEP chief said, especially since oil prices have fallen from more than $140 a barrel at mid-2008 peaks to about $40 a barrel.

A barrel of oil contains 158 litres and OECD consumption is about 20 billion barrels a year, he said. This is just one example, there may be many others, of funding, he said.

“I am concerned about the prospect of a meaningful deal in Copenhagen if there is not a significant financial package on the table,” he said. Cash would encourage poor nations to step up actions to curb rising greenhouse gas emissions. The argument that we cannot afford this does not, on any serious analysis, hold much water— especially given the cost to the global economy of failure to act on climate change, he said.

Carbon markets, which could also be a source of funds to help fight climate change, were unlikely to contribute enough cash in early years of a new climate deal, he said.

Steiner said there were promising signs that economic stimulus packages by many nations, ranging from the United States to China, were being tailored to help a shift towards greener growth and away from dependence on depleting fossil fuels.

The United Nations climate panel says that greenhouse gases from burning fossil fuels are a prime cause of warming that will cause more heat waves, droughts, rising sea levels and more powerful storms.

The Financial Express (New Delhi), 23 March 2009

This week the G-20 leaders met in London to discuss the global financial crisis, which is set to dominate the international agenda for some time. A parallel debate has been under way here in Bonn on another financial question, which affects an even greater systemic crisis: the funding required to tackle global climate change.

Climate negotiators are in the middle of the first of three major meetings scheduled for this year, before a fourth one at Copenhagen in December brings together 192 countries to secure a global deal on climate change.

Developed countries insist that major developing countries should also reduce their greenhouse gas emissions to mitigate climate change. Poor countries, in turn, demand compensation for the costs imposed by a problem they played no part in creating.

Climate change is a real threat. Relative to 1990, global emissions must fall 50 per cent by 2050 to restrict average temperature increases to 2 degrees. Breaching that level would risk large-scale human development setbacks, of which the poorest countries and the poorest people would bear the brunt. Countries also have to adapt to an already changing climate: changing agricultural practices, building flood defences, preparing for water shortages, and so forth. Major developing countries have already announced unilateral actions: China is spending $200 billion on ecology-friendly investments; Brazil promises a 70 per cent reduction in Amazonian deforestation (a major source of emissions) by 2017; and India’s national action plan on climate change has a bold vision for renewable energy.

In principle, the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change — and the Bali Action Plan guiding the current negotiations — recognises the obligation of developed countries to provide financial, technological and capacity building support for poor countries’ efforts. But the consensus ends there. The first contentious issue is the amount of funding required. Estimates vary wildly. For mitigation technologies, current spending is anywhere between $77 billion and $164 billion a year; and additional annual funding of $262 billion to $670 billion would be needed by 2030. Note, even the higher estimate is a fraction of the $3 trillion being spent on the financial crisis. Spending on climate adaptation is about $1 billion annually — when some estimates suggest up to $86 billion would be needed. Thanks to such wide ranges, developing countries hesitate to put a specific estimate in their proposals, calling instead for covering the full incremental costs of low-carbon technologies. Fair enough; but that makes getting a concrete commitment from developed countries harder. And it reinforces the challenge of enforcing compliance, one of the biggest problems with the climate regime so far.

Secondly, where will the money come from? There is a major debate about private versus public financing. Developed countries argue that, like current spending on low-carbon technologies, the private sector would lead on funding mitigation and adaptation in developing countries as well. Poor countries strongly disagree. They note that private investment flows into projects only when profits are expected. If the higher capital, operational and intellectual property costs make projects commercially unviable in a developing country or divert resources from other development priorities, then public financing support is needed. In their proposal for a new financing mechanism, developing countries demand this public financing from rich-country governments. But the economic crisis complicates the challenge: getting public financing guarantees for the developing world when rich countries are busy priming fiscal pumps at home will not be easy. A third point of contention are the conditions under which funding would be made available. There is a fear that developing countries would be treated like aid recipients, subject to donor-imposed conditionalities. Developed countries are keen to ensure that money sent abroad is accounted for. The developing world insists the process cannot be top-down. They want a financing mechanism that is “demand-driven” to support climate policies over which they have “ownership”.

A new Adaptation Fund offers balanced representation for developed, developing, least-developed and small-island states. It avoids replicating the World Bank’s historical model of fewer votes for developing countries. Yet, past experience offers reasons for caution. Despite greater representation of poor countries in regional development banks, dominant developed country players have continued to have de facto veto power. On climate, the World Bank’s Clean Technology Fund has been hostage to US politicians and organisations opposed to transferring coal-based technologies, even if the potential efficiency gains for developing countries are large. Formal representation and voting rights alone cannot ensure real voice and ownership. In the end, the debate boils down to the purpose of climate funding. A clock ticker in the plenary chamber reminds delegates that 247 days are left on the road to Copenhagen. The prospect looks dim unless there are enforceable commitments on financing, and poor countries are equal partners in the governance of funds. We now know the price of responding to the financial crisis: already 3-4 per cent of global income. What price the future of the planet?

The Indian Express (New Delhi), 4 April 2009

The prospect of Nano, the world's cheapest car, clogging Indian roads and raising emission levels has figured in the ongoing global discourse on a new climate change deal.

Shyam Saran, special envoy to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, pooh-poohed the suggestion that people in developing countries should not aspire to own cars. ‘‘This is not saleable,'' Saran said on Tuesday, adding that India sought to deal with climate change without compromising on its developmental needs.

Responding to questions from media persons, Saran said Nano was one of the most fuel-efficient cars and its entry into the market would not divert India from its focus on developing mass transport systems as sustainable development.

‘‘We can't say automobile industry should meanwhile not develop,'' Saran said. ‘‘We can't tell people you don't buy car or TVs or that they shouldn't have access to energy because of the climate change problem.''

Asked if India was prepared to deviate from business as usual to protect environment, Saran said that developed countries should instead ask what kind of mitigation and adaptation measures it would be able to undertake with adequate financial and technological support. Putting the ball in the court of developed countries, Saran said they should discharge their historical responsibilities for the climate change crisis. He also criticised them for raising the bogey of India being the third largest emitter of greenhouse gases although India's contribution was no more than 4 per cent.

He buttressed his defence by pointing out that the per capita emission in India was 1.7 tonnes of carbon dioxide per year, while the corresponding figure for the globe was 7.5 tonnes and the US was 20 tonnes. As for the negotiations building up to what is meant to be the next major milestone in the climate change regime, Saran said he was disappointed with the progress as there was as yet no clarity on targets and the scale of funding and technology transfer for mitigation and adaptation.

This was despite the fact that US, which was not part of the Kyoto Protocol of 1977, rejoined climate change negotiations at Bonn.

The Times of India (New Delhi), 9 April 2009

The United States is “very interested” in an Indian proposal to create a global network of climate technology centres and thinks it deserves to make it to a UN climate change agreement scheduled for later this year.

Jonathan Pershing, the US president’s deputy special envoy for climate change, told IANS on the sidelines of a UN conference here that there was “enormous opportunity for common work” between India and the US over efforts to combat climate change.

The Bonn conference, which ended Wednesday without accord on key issues, was the first of several organised by the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in the lead up to a December summit where countries will try to agree to a final climate deal.

Pershing said that US negotiators plan to hold a series of bilateral meetings with Indian business leaders to explore how they can be involved in proposals seeking to foster technological solutions to the problem of climate change, which is caused by greenhouse gases emitted in the process of industrial production.

He specifically welcomed an Indian proposal submitted to the UNFCCC on Monday seeking to establish a series of climate innovation centres, each focusing on developing a key technological product that would help countries mitigate the emission of greenhouse gases or adapt to the impact of climate change.

“I think the US is very interested in that deal. There may be ways to facilitate that in the agreement,” Pershing told IANS.

The Indian delegation to the talks, led by the Prime Minister’s Special Envoy Shyam Saran, highlighted technology transfer as a key Indian demand, arguing in the proposal that “technology is the only way to achieve the high-impact changes required.”

Significantly, the Indian proposal also calls for a more lenient global patents regime - or intellectual property rights (IPR) - on grounds that negotiators privately said resemble those cited some years ago to help loosen patents over life-saving drugs in the fight against HIV/AIDS.

“In order to enable the widest diffusion and transfer of cutting edge climate technologies, it is important that we review the international IPR regime to balance rewards for innovators with the greater good of humankind,” the proposal said.

As the conference wound up after 10 days of negotiations, Pershing said the US was “impressed by the commitments and actions being taken by large developing countries like India, China and Indonesia.’

“If we look at their domestic programmes, they have already begun to take significant steps forward on climate change.

“Significant efforts are underway in India. We see programmes on renewables, land management, programmes that address adaptation right now, in advance of any action or formal commitments by the convention parties” - countries that are signatories to the UNFCCC.

Pershing’s comments came at the close of a meeting marked by major differences between the demands made by industrialised and developing countries.

Developing countries want to see wealthy industrialised nations pledge much deeper cuts in the emissions of their greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide.

But industrialised countries argue that major developing countries such as India and China must also commit to cuts and open up their climate change programmes to international scrutiny.

Developing countries say their emissions are tiny compared to those of the developed world, when calculated on a per capita basis.

They also point out that the entire UN climate change negotiating process is based on the fundamental principle that industrialised countries, who are mainly responsible for causing climate change, must move before developing countries.

The Economic Times (New Delhi), 11 April 2009

The present challenge faced by the world lies in returning to a path of sustainable development and this is much bigger than meeting the threat of climate change, R.K. Pachauri, chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), said here on Saturday.

For over 150 years, the world pursued the process of industrialisation and the path of development was clearly proving more and more unsustainable. What was required was “to bring our forces and intellectual capacity in tandem whereby we can meet the challenge effectively without major disruption, without compromising on the ability of future generations of their needs.”

Dr. Pachauri was delivering the keynote address at a function to commemorate 50 years of Hindu-Hitachi Scholarship and a Symposium on Energy, Environment and Future India-Japan Collaboration.

Noting that climate change was only a “part of a major failure” that human society had committed without realising it, Dr. Pachauri said that even now sceptics continued to question the scientific validity that IPCC had brought out on the adverse effects of climate change.

Explaining the harmful impacts of climate change, he said 11 of the last 12 years ranked among the 12 warmest years in the instrumental record of global surface temperature. Decreases in glaciers had contributed about 28 per cent of sea level rise since 1993. Water supplies stored in glaciers were projected to decline.

Dr. Pachauri called for greater research in areas such as drought-resistance species and salt-tolerant species. Pointing out that India and Japan had reverence for culture and traditions, he wanted the two countries to evolve together a model of sustainable development which would be an example for the rest of the world. He suggested collaborative projects in renewable energy and green buildings.

M. Mizukami, minister in the Embassy of Japan, said the Japanese government last year announced a scheme to accept 3,00,000 foreign students by which the government would raise the number of foreign students in Japan from 1,20,000 to 3,00,000 by 2020. Compared to China which sent 70,000 students to Japan, India currently sent only 500 students, the envoy said.

He referred to his country’s collaboration with India in environment and energy projects being implemented in Tamil Nadu.

A. Asrani, former Indian ambassador to Japan, said that in the last five years India was the largest recipient of Japan’s Overseas Development Assistance, covering a large number of power and energy projects.

Pointing out that Japan was a major manufacturer of civil nuclear energy equipment, Mr. Asrani said that unlike the United States, France and Russia, the government of Japan might not be in a position to sign a cooperation agreement with India in the near future.

Listing a number of factors, he emphasised that public opinion in Japan should be moulded in favour of cooperation with India.

A.K. Kolar, Professor of the Department of Mechanical Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology-Madras, highlighted the importance of closer ties at the level of academic institutions and establishments of higher learning between the two countries. T. Yoshida, chief representative of the New Energy and Industrial Technology Developement Organisation (NEDO), New Delhi, and N. Sakamoto, senior researcher, Hitachi Research Institute, spoke.

The Hindu (New Delhi), 12 April 2009

A global farm policy think tank has recommended that agriculture should form part of the international negotiations on climate change in the forthcoming Apex Conference of Parties of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) at Copenhagen in December 2009.

A policy brief issued by the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) has pointed out that with suitable technology and management, agriculture, which now contributes about 15 per cent to green house gas (GHG) emissions, can actually become an important sink for emissions even from other sectors.

Besides, agriculture will be adversely affected by the climate change and millions of poor farmers will need help in adapting to the weather patterns. The mechanism for funding research on climate adaptation and mitigation by the agriculture sector needs to be discussed at the UNFCCC meet at Copenhagen.

Apart from agriculture’s direct contribution of 15 per cent to the GHG emissions, land-use related changes, including forest loss, account for additional 19 per cent to harmful emissions. While reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation has been formally included in the current negotiations on climate change, agriculture as such has been left out. This should now be put on the agenda for the Copenhagen meet, the IFPRI has asserted.

The developing world accounts for 50 per cent of agricultural emissions and 80 per cent of land-use change and forestry emissions.

“The ongoing negotiations to address climate change provide a unique opportunity to combine low-cost mitigation and essential adaptation outcomes with poverty reduction,” the IFPRI brief has stated.

Pointing to the dramatic consequences of climate change for agriculture, the note warns that water sources will become more variable, droughts and floods will stress agricultural systems, some coastal food producing areas will be inundated by the seas and food production will fall in some places in the interiors. Developing economies and the poorest of the poor are likely to be hit the hardest.

It has called for funding research to improve understanding and create capacity for predicting the interactions between climate change and agriculture.

“Agriculture has huge potential to cost-effectively mitigate GHGs through changes in agricultural technologies and management practices.”

Changing crop mixes to include more plants that are perennial or have deep root systems increases the amount of carbon stored in the soil. Also, cultivation systems that leave residue in the fields and reduce land tilling, encourage the build up of soil carbon.

It has also pointed out that agricultural production differs qualitatively from other sources of GHGs. The sources of emission in the farm sector are individually small, geographically dispersed and often served by inadequate physical and institutional infrastructure.

“It is much easier to monitor 1,500 coal-based power plants in the US than several million small farmers who rely on fields, pastures and forests for their livelihood”, it said.

It has suggested that the negotiations at the UNFCCC must go beyond the traditional schemes developed under the Kyoto Protocol and should encourage funding for climate change mitigation in the agricultural sector.

Business Standard (New Delhi), 13 April 2009

While it is known that the adverse impact of global warming on glaciers could unleash food shortages, now comes some more distressing news. A study conducted by Palampur-based agriculture university suggests a shrinkage of apple belt in Himachal Pradesh. The reports, if true, portend a grim picture for Himachal’s apples. If the rise in temperatures continues, in the next three decades it may not be possible to grow apples in the traditional apple belt of the hill state where the fruit has been a major revenue earner. Warm winters and less snow — “white manure” for the apples-— have always made apple growers anxious. The farmers in Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh had to suffer due to less rainfall affecting the production of fruit orchards as well as the rabi and cash crops.

This is not the first time the experts have warned of global warming affecting crop yields. Agriculture, as it is dependent upon vagaries of weather in India, is most vulnerable to the feared climate change. The Tata Energy Research Institute reported that the threat of climate change to Indian agriculture lies in the physiological response of warming on crops as well as the fact that many farmers are ill-prepared to adapt to changes in weather or crop yield. According to a British report authored by Nicholas Stern, former chief economist of the World Bank, India’s growth story could be re-scripted, unless it shifted to a low carbon economy.

Fortunately, Himachal Pradesh has decided to emerge as India’s first carbon free state. The Indian Council of Agricultural Research has been conducting research to minimise the impact of global warming on crop yield. Both the BJP and the Congress have included global warming as a key issue in their manifestos. The moot point is whether the much-promised initiatives will translate into action. The HP government would do well to take measures to contain air pollution and use of coal and fuel wood. It is equally imperative to conduct intensive research into climate changes and how it leads to crop failures. It may be too early to press the alarm button as yet, but if the warning signals are not heeded, the economic cost of global warming might turn out to be too high.

The Tribune (Chandigarh), 16 April 2009

President Obama came to office promising swift and comprehensive action to combat global climate change, and the topic remains a surefire applause line in his speeches in America and abroad.

Yet the administration has taken a cautious and rather passive role on the issue, proclaiming broad goals while remaining aloof from details of climate legislation now in Congress.

The president’s budget initially included roughly $650 billion in revenue over 10 years from a cap-and-trade emissions plan that he wants adopted. But the administration, while insisting that its health care initiative be protected, did not fight to keep cap-and-trade in the budget resolutions that Congress passed in early April, and it wound up in neither the House’s version nor the Senate’s.

Overseas, American officials are telling their counterparts that they need time to gauge the American public’s appetite for an ambitious carbon reduction scheme before leading any international effort.

Has the administration scaled back its global-warming goals, at least for this year, or is it engaged in sophisticated misdirection?

Maybe some of both. While addressing climate change appears to be slipping down the president’s list of priorities for the year, he is holding in reserve a powerful club to regulate carbon dioxide emissions through executive authority.

That club takes the form of Environmental Protection Agency regulation of the gases blamed for the warming of the planet, an authority granted the agency by the Supreme Court’s reading of the Clean Air Act. Administration officials consistently say they would much prefer that Congress write new legislation to pre-empt the E.P.A. regulatory power, but they are clearly holding it in reserve as a prod to reluctant lawmakers and recalcitrant industries and as evidence of good faith to other nations.

Industry lobbyists and members of Congress who are engaged in writing energy and global warming bills say they are well aware of the E.P.A. process bearing down on them.

“Once the Supreme Court declared carbon dioxide to be a pollutant under the Clean Air Act, E.P.A. had no choice but to act,” said Representative Rick Boucher, a moderate Democrat from a coal-producing region of Virginia. “Most people would rather have Congress act. We can be more balanced; we can take into account the effects on the economy. But if we don’t undertake this, E.P.A. certainly will.”

Still, the agency’s regulations would take months to write and years to become fully effective. Meanwhile, Congress is already starting work on energy and climate legislation, though without significant guidance from the White House, at least in public.

Business lobbyists welcome the White House’s go-slow approach, saying the issue is too complicated and too costly to be rushed, especially in a recession.

“We have not until now had a national debate on a climate change proposal, period,” said Karen A. Harbert, a former senior Energy Department official who now heads the United States Chamber of Commerce’s energy institute. “That has to happen for any piece of legislation to achieve broad support across the country.”

Ms. Harbert and other business lobbyists also welcomed the administration’s hesitancy to undertake regulation of climate-altering gases under E.P.A. authority, saying the matter should be fully aired before Congress so that all interests and regions could be heard.

Keith McCoy, vice president for energy and resources policy at the National Association of Manufacturers, said his organization was “strongly opposed to an E.P.A. regulatory process for greenhouse gas emissions under the Clean Air Act.”

Mr. McCoy said his members would prefer a binding international treaty that would cover all nations, particularly those whose industries compete with energy-intensive American manufacturers. “Absent that,” he said, “we would prefer a robust and transparent debate within Congress.”

The administration’s caution leaves many environmental advocates frustrated, although most are reluctant to speak on the record for fear of alienating their allies inside government.

The Asian Age (New Delhi), 18 April 2009

It is not an exaggeration to say that the team that the President, Mr. Barack Obama, appointed to promote his green agenda is nothing short of outstanding — a great combination of scientists and policymakers committed to building an energy economy that is efficient, clean and secure. Now there is only one vacancy left for him to fill. And it’s one that only he can fill: Green President. Is he ready to do that job with the passion and fight that will be required to transform America’s energy future? Hope so. Not sure yet.

Have no doubt, the president is off to a terrific start: His stimulus package will provide an incredible boost for all forms of renewable energy. The Energy Bill being drafted by House Democrats Mr. Henry Waxman and Mr Ed Markey contains unprecedented incentives for energy efficiency and clean-tech innovation. And the ruling from Mr. Obama’s Environmental Protection Agency saying that carbon dioxide is a pollutant that threatens public health was courageous and historic.

But while all of that is hugely important, we must not fool ourselves, as we have done for so many years: Price matters. Without a fixed, long-term, durable price on carbon, none of the Obama clean-tech initiatives will achieve the scale needed to have an impact on climate change or make America the leader it must be in the next great industrial revolution: ET, or energy technology. At this stage, I’d settle for any carbon price mechanism — cap and trade, fee-bates, carbon tax and/or gasoline tax — as long as its real and provides consumers and investors a long-term incentive to shift to clean cars, appliances and buildings.

Mr. Bob Lutz, a vice-chairman at General Motors, offers a useful example of why price matters. When Congress demands that Detroit make smaller, lighter, better mileage vehicles, but then refuses to put a higher price on carbon — like with a gasoline tax — so more consumers will want to buy these smaller cars, said Mr. Lutz, it is the equivalent of ordering all American shirtmakers to make only size smalls while never asking the American people to go on a diet. You’re not going to sell a lot of size smalls. Have no doubt: From right-wing tea parties to coal states to manufacturers, there is going to be a no-holds-barred campaign to kill any carbon price signal, including cap and trade. A vast army of lobbyists is already working against it. Only Mr. Obama can blunt this. Only he has the platform for framing and elevating the issue properly and taking it to the American people with the passion and clarity needed to move the country. It will take more than one speech.

Here’s one way to start: “My fellow Americans, I want to speak to you about a new economic law. You’ve heard of Moore’s Law in information technology. I’d like to speak to you about the ‘Law of More’ in energy technology. Americans, Indians, Chinese, Africans, we all want more — more comfort in our homes, more mobility in our lives, more technologies with which to innovate. But there is only one way all 6.3 billion of us can have more and not make this an unliveable planet, and that is by living our lives and running our businesses in more sustainable ways and properly accounting for it.

“Right now we’re paying a huge price — a tax — for everyone trying to achieve more in an unsustainable way. But the ‘More Tax’ is not imposed by the US government.

“It is a tax imposed by the market and will continue rising indefinitely as more and more people want more and more stuff. It will steadily drive up gasoline prices, home heating prices and factory electricity prices. But because this ‘More Tax’ is set by the market and not the government, many opponents contend that there’s nothing to be done: ‘Oh, $4.50 a gallon gasoline — that’s just the market at work. We can’t do anything about that’. And then all that tax money out of your pocket goes to enrich oil companies and petro-dictators. “My proposal is that today we fix a durable price on carbon-based fossil fuels, but set it to begin only in 2011, after we’re out of this recession. Every home builder, air-conditioning manufacturer, gasoline refiner, carmaker will know that it’s coming and will, I believe, immediately look for ways to profit from and invest in more energy efficient systems. Yes, the cost of gasoline or kilowatt hours will rise in the short term. But in the long term, your actual bills and expenses will go down because your car, appliances and factory will become steadily more productive and give you more power for less energy.

“I call it the ‘Carbon Tax Cut’. You won’t receive the dividend in the first week or month, but you will get it soon, and it will be a permanent tax cut, a gift that will keep on giving”.

“So those are our choices, folks — an escalating ‘More Tax’ forever, premised on immediate gratification and short-term thinking, or a ‘Carbon Tax Cut’ forever, which is exactly what you’ll get from establishing a carbon price signal that shapes the market in favour of American interests and not those of our adversaries and competitors. If you’re with me, write your member of Congress and senator today”.

The Asian Age (New Delhi), 27 April 2009

On the occasion of Earth Day today, the people of Uttarakhand have little to cheer. Their resources taken away to oil the engine of economy, they can only hope for a new model of development that empowers them.

Social activists warn against the greed for more. Green man and Padma Vibhushan Sunderlal Bahuguna has urged the people not to be taken in by grandiose schemes that view forests as means for generating revenue alone. Whereas the role of the hill forests was to maintain climatic balance which was only possible if their ecological importance was kept in mind.

“It will be prejudicial to the existence of nature if we think only in favour short-term economic utility. The only way to go forward is keeping the forests in tact,” said Bahuguna.

Indiscriminate human interference has affected the ecology of hills. Independent reports say the water level in most rivers has come down to 50 per cent. The degradation of rivers could be checked by planting more trees.

“At the time of Independence, we had gurgling water streams, but with each passing year the water level in most rivers has reduced while streams have mostly vanished.

“Water scarcity looms large, it is not possible to import water and the only solution is to plant broad-leaf trees everywhere,” he suggested.

Reckless deforestation is one of the major problems of the region. A few patches, once under cultivation, are now barren with loss of fertility. Expansion of road network is a symbol of development but it poses a threat to the ecosystem. Blasting of mountains and felling forests also damage environment.

“We must remember that the main role of hill forests is not about economics but to maintain a balance in the climatic conditions of the country.

In our zeal to promote GDP-driven policies, we have adopted western parameters for judging prosperity.

“This has left our mountains barren and rivers dry. Even pilgrim sites are being rampantly exploited under the garb of religious tourism. During my countless journeys in the state and around the country, I have sensed a general feeling of helplessness among the people who feel they no longer have control over their resources,” said Padma Shri Dr Anil Joshi, patron of the Himalayan Environment Studies and Conservation Organisation (HESCO), an NGO.

The state of rivers is a major concern. The “Save the Rivers” campaign has not only generated awareness on the impending water crisis in Uttarakhand but also stirred up communities in Kuamon and Garhwal to fight for their right over these resources.

Demanding a uniform and people-friendly rehabilitation policy and ensuring participation of local communities in projects, members of the “Save the Rivers” campaign led by Jamna Lal Bajaj awardee social activist Radha Behen have undertaken padyatras in the river valleys and also shram dhan to clean the streams and rivers.

During the 2008 and 2009 campaigns called “Jal Yatras”, members of the campaign studied the state of 50 big and small rivers, from the Tons in the west to the Kali Ganga in the east and spoke of concerns of men and women living in these valleys. They held padyatras and meetings throughout the year in localities.

“There has been a strong tradition in Uttarakhand of planting trees. Old women and men would plant trees in the hope that many years after they were no more, their grandchildren would be able to savour the fruit of these trees.

“But this tradition may not last with governments becoming apathetic to the concerns of the people,” observed Radha Behen.

A total of 250 power projects are proposed in the state which will affect people in many villages but the objections by grEarth Day: Activists warn against unbridled greed am sabhas and gram panchayat are of no consequence to the powers that be.

In fast-paced consumerism, there is little space for environmental concerns. “I am extremely worried at the uncaring attitude of the government and the bureaucracy. Rain-fed rivers are drying up and there is less water from glaciers. “Farmers too are crying for water, but there is none to pay heed to them,” said Dr. Ravi Chopra of the People’s Science Institute.

In the Ganga valley seven dams have been built, 10 are under construction and another 21 are proposed.

In the Yamuna valley six have already been constructed, two are under construction and there is a proposal for 21 more. Besides, there is a proposal for 100 small dams. Tehri has a 65-km-long lake yet people are have to travel several miles to fetch water. The number of villages that were submerged in the process are 125.

The Tribune (Chandigarh), 23 April 2009

You can tend a garden, recycle materials, ride a bicycle more often than drive a car to contribute in a personal way to the cause of planet Earth which was imperilled by climate change, Beth Middleton, research ecologist with the National Wetlands Research Center, Louisiana, US, said in her Earth Day lecture on Wednesday.

Addressing a mixed audience of scientists, students and the lay public, Dr. Middleton said simple steps such as these may only leave a small footprint on the earth; but they could inspire others around to follow suit and enlarge the positive impact on the environment.

Rise in temperatures
The Earth Day lecture on “Climate Change and the Future of Wetlands” was hosted by the US Consulate General, Chennai and the C.P. Ramaswami Aiyar Foundation.

Pointing out that climate change was one thing that brought the world together, Dr. Middleton said India was tipped to witness 10 per cent increase in rainfall and a 3 to 5 degree Celcius rise in temperatures. Besides, sea levels were rising at the rate of about 1 mm annually, she said.

The consequences of more rain and soaring temperatures included disrupted hydrology dynamics of wetland eco systems, increase in frequency of flooding and extended droughts, the research ecologist said.

Calling for international dialogue among scientific institutions to draw up strategies for sustainable use of wetlands, Dr. Middleton said it was also important for people to “develop a relationship” with Nature.

Call to centre, state
Nandita Krishna, director, C.P. Ramaswami Aiyar Foundation, piloted a resolution urging the government at the Centre and State to declare the endangered Pallikaranai and Pulicat biodiversity zones as Ramsar sites (named after the international convention on wetlands in 1975 in Ramsar, Iran).

The Hindu (New Delhi), 23 April 2009

The number of people affected by climate-related crises over the next six years is projected to rise annually by 54 per cent to reach 375 million. This could overwhelm the humanitarian aid system, international agency Oxfam said on Wednesday.

The projected rise is mainly due to a combination of entrenched poverty and people migrating to densely populated slums which are susceptible to the increasing number of climatic events. The problems could be compounded by the political failure to address these risks and a humanitarian system that is wanting.

In its report, ‘The Ri