Why Worry? Failing Infrastructure + Falling Water Tables=Dry Days Ahead!

On Tuesday, we looked at some of the many things that have been justified in the name of the Commonwealth Games: new flyovers, the metro, sports arenas, airport terminals, fancy liquor stores, get-tough-on public drinking laws, get-tough-on beggar laws, calls for reduction in public urination and spitting...it's a very long list.  

But aside from the design of the Commonwealth Games village, have you ever heard anyone use the Commonwealth Games to justify improved water infrastructure? Probably not.  That's because nobody expects Commonwealth Games athletes or tourists to drink Delhi's water; neither will they have to wake up early to fill buckets of water or carry jugs of water home from a public tap.  And they aren't likely to go for a swim in the Yamuna or in a local nallah.  So our lack of water won't embarrass us like bad traffic, beggars and public urination will.  

But it is common knowledge that our water infrastructure is a mess.  Every day, on my way to work, I cross one or two small streams in the road--the result of leaking water mains.  In the photo to the right, you can see one that is just off Khel Gaon Marg, near the Hauz Khas police station.  The water has been flowing there for at least a month, possibly as a result of the street light upgradation announced by the MCD sign.  

If you need statistics to convince you of the problems we have with our water infrastructure, you either don't live in Delhi or you should get your eyes checked--but here are two just for good measure: Delhi wastes about half the clean water we get, and about 45 percent of Delhi's population is not connected to the sewage system.  

Yes, in Delhi, lack of clean water is already a disaster for millions of people already. But the Hindustan Times reported that, according to a recent study by McKinsey and Company, things could get much worse by 2030:

"The report states that if existing services are not improved drastically, the per capita water supply to a average citizen could drop from an average of 105 litres to only 65 litre a day in the next 20 years... Also, 70-80 per cent of the sewage generated in the country would go untreated, while of the 377 million tonne per annum solid waste that would be generated by 2030, only about 295 million tonne will be collected because of inadequate facilities."

What's the problem?  Apparently, India is not spending anything like what it needs to spend on infrastructure in order to keep up with growing urban population.  According to the story in HT, India's per capita annual spending on urban infrastructure is just $17.  China, by contrast, spends $116.  We need to spend more on our cities.  

Of course, one way to reduce urban population growth is to improve the quality of life in rural areas. However,according to a recent parliamentary committee report, the water situation in rural areas is even worse than it is in the cities. Here's what Mint said about it:

....just 12% of rural families have individual household tap connections and only 16% of the population gets drinking water from public taps, according to the legislative panel’s report. Further, the sanitation coverage in villages is less than 65%.

You will sometimes hear higher numbers--like 84% of villages are covered by rural water supply--but these are misleading because many pumps that are included in those numbers are not in working order.  And of course the water table is falling throughout north India, which means more pumps dry up all the time.  

If you have any doubt about the falling water table, try dropping a pebble in an old well and see how long it takes to reach the bottom--in Delhi, at least, in most cases the pebble will take a long time to reach a dry bottom; you really need a tube well to reach water around here. (For some history of the Delhi water table, go here. )  

You don't need to be a rocket scientist to understand what deep, dry wells suggest about our water consumption, but you might be pleased to know that the rocket scientists do have something interesting to to say about this trend!  A team of researchers analyzed satellite data from NASA and learned some interesting things about groundwater.  Here's what NASA's website had to say:

"Beneath northern India’s irrigated fields of wheat, rice, and barley ... beneath its densely populated cities of Jaiphur and New Delhi, the groundwater has been disappearing.... [Researchers] found that groundwater levels have been declining by an average of one meter every three years (one foot per year). More than 109 cubic km (26 cubic miles) of groundwater disappeared between 2002 and 2008 -- double the capacity of India's largest surface water reservoir, the Upper Wainganga, and triple that of Lake Mead, the largest man-made reservoir in the United States."

In other words, our use of water--for farms and for cities-- is unsustainable. If we don't do something about it soon, we're going to be in deep trouble--and you don't need to be a rocket scientist to figure that one out! 

Hack Job at Open Magazine

On Saturday, I coincidentally saw two important pieces on the recent criticism being leveled at climate science. One was Open Magazine's current cover story; the other was a statement on the Himalayan glacier controversy from the citizen activists at Delhi Platform.  These seemed important to look at sooner, rather than later, so I'm running this issue of the dhaba on Monday instead of our usual Tuesday.   I'll examine each piece in turn.

This week, Open Magazine's cover story is boldly titled, "The Climate Change Fraud."  The article, which pretends to be an investigative expose of science gone wrong, claims climate change is a "hoax" and a "fraud" and that "never have so few fooled so many for so long, ever."  If you are wondering how it is that little old Open managed to beat every mainstream paper and reputable science journal in the world to this story, I'll explain it to you: Open's scoop does not actually involve journalism; it is a sloppy rehash of arguments from climate skeptics' web sites, press releases and films.  Open's reporter, Ninad Sheth, makes no effort get a variety of perspectives; the quotes he provides come exclusively from a small group of well-known climate change deniers and skeptics, most of whom give quotes for a living.

Compare Open's incompetence with Tehelka this week.  When Tehelka wanted to do a story about the fighting in Chhattisgarh, they did what good magazines are supposed to do: they sent a reporter and a photographer into the field where they spent seven days, at considerable risk to themselves, in territory where both the Maoists and the Salwa Judum are active. They interviewed a wide variety of villagers about the problems they face living in a war zone.   Also this week, in their cover story on Bihar, Tehelka managed to interview both Nitish Kumar and Lalu Prasad.  Tehelka is not perfect; I've been critical of them before.  But unlike Open, Tehelka generally expects their journalists to practice... journalism.

I'd love to spend all day going through the Open story and picking out the ridiculous bits.  But I'm going to resist.  Instead, I'll say just a few words about Open's "expert" sources--something their reporter chose not to do.   Open slams Dr. Rajendra K Pachauri, "the leader of the climate change mafia" for "having no training whatsoever in climate science." But they won't tell you that Lord Christopher Monckton, the "climate expert" who they rely on to criticize climate graphs used by Pachauri,  doesn't have any formal training in climate science either. Lord Monckton of Brenchley boasts a degree in classics and a diploma in journalism, which may explain the difficulty he's had interpreting graphs in the past.  For the record, Lord Monckton  is employed as Chief Policy Adviser for the Science and Public Policy Institute (SPPI), an American climate skeptics' think tank.  SPPI does not reveal the sources of it's funding, and it is not required to do so by US law.  We do know that SPPI founder Robert Ferguson has had a long term and lucrative relationship with the oil industry.

Or take Patrick Michaels who works, according to Open, for "the Cato Institute, a noted US think-tank." Just to be clear, the Cato Institute may be "noted," for it's eclectic blend of right wing and libertarian views, but a quick internet search will tell you it is neither mainstream nor neutral, endorsing as it does legalization of drugs and the privatization of the American Social Security system.  Michaels by the way, admits to have taken large amounts of money from big oil companies, a practice that many consider a conflict of interests.  So when Open quotes Michaels as saying that Dr. Pachauri should resign, because, among other things, "he has a consistent record of mixing his political views with climate science," it sounds a bit off.  After all, mixing politics with science is what Michaels gets paid to do; his own organization boasts that he "barely has time to sleep. With more than 150 media appearances since the breaking of what has come to be called "Climategate," he has quickly become the most recognized face decrying the obstructionism of global warming alarmists." 

So let's be clear; Open didn't break this story; they just uncritically bought an old package being sold by right-wing American think tanks with close ties to the oil industry.   If the editors at Open really believed this story were true,  they would have had to fact check it and evaluate opposing views; a story of this magnitude would require as much. That they didn't suggests this was  nothing more than a cynical effort to sell magazines. Shame!

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By now it is clear that serious mistakes--and in some cases even misrepresentations--have been made by climate scientists, both in India and abroad.  Some of these are reprehensible; some merely regrettable.  My sense is that the reaction of most environmentalists has been healthy.  There is no use pretending that this kind of stuff doesn't hurt.   Climate scientists need to get their house in order; we cannot tolerate sloppy or dishonest science on this issue--it's much too important for that, the stakes a too high. But so far there has been nothing revealed, in hacked emails or anywhere else, that in any way undermines the lion's share of the research that supports the idea that human made climate change is a huge and growing problem.  To prove that, you'd need to find a hacked email that reads something like this.

For a more thoughtful look at this issue as it's playing out locally, let's look at a statement from Delhi Platform, an organization is made up of citizen activists who think climate change is a problem, but don't apologize for sloppy science.  These activists are not formally trained scientists, they are not reporters, they don't get paid for the work they do or the magazines they sell.  However, the members I have met are extraordinarily dedicated, well-read, and articulate.   Here's what they have to say about the Himalayan Glacier controversy; feel free to pass this statement on others who might be interested.  I think it is thoughtful, serious, and grounded in real science. I urge you to read it carefully.  You can get in touch with Delhi Platform here.

DELHI PLATFORM

Statement on the Himalayan Glaciers controversy

29 January 2010

                                    

A huge controversy has been generated in recent days over the much quoted lines in the IPCC’s 2007 report: “Glaciers in the Himalaya are receding faster than in any part of the world and, if the present rate continues, the likelihood of them disappearing by the year 2035 and perhaps sooner is very high if the Earth keeps warming at the current rate” (Working Group 2, page 493). We do need to question how a statement of such magnitude, without peer review, made its way into the IPCC report. That it was discovered, externally, more than two years later raises concerns about both the mindset and the weakness of the processes of the IPCC in checking and correcting information they collate, information that is so vital in the global debate. However, to question the credibility of the science of the global warming, supported as it is by a wealth of empirical evidence, or to question IPCC’s work, as is happening in some quarters, is gross exaggeration and sometimes driven by dubious and malafide intentions.

More importantly, the ongoing debate ignores four key issues:

one, that glacial melting, happening extensively in many regions and altitudes of the Himalayas, is already impacting people’s lives in the Indian Himalayan states;

two, science ignores people’s own perceptions of their reality and their context;

three, the critics have not properly placed the issue in the overall context and fragility of glaciers globally; and

four, that the situation is going to unavoidably worsen, hence deepening an unfolding crisis of access to water.

Since the Earth’s average warming gets amplified into much higher levels of warming in the mid-level Himalayas and at higher altitudes, the impacts there are already huge and varied. At a public hearing on ‘Impacts of Climate Change on the Himalayan Region’, organized by Oxfam India in late 2009, people from different Himalayan communities presented testimonies of extensive melting, receding and disappearance of small glaciers in parts of Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand based on their lived experience over the years. One professional guide who has traversed high altitudes for many years talked of the disappearance of numerous small glaciers over the last 20 years in J&K. Small glaciers, said another speaker, have disappeared from the Sarva Valley. Sigri and Chhotadhara glacier, both in Himachal, are receding rapidly. The Dhani Nara glacier, also in Himachal Pradesh, does not exist any more. Numerous presenters talked of lessening and irregular snowfall in recent years. This has obvious impacts on glacial mass and melting in the medium term. Women spoke of how water sources have dried up, already causing distress in their daily lives, impacting drinking water access and water supply for agriculture.

People’s observations of their lived reality over time and of the impacts of global warming on their lives need to be given greater space and credence than is being done at the moment by formal science. This is particularly relevant in the area of glacial melting in the Himalayas given that many authorities, including the minister for environment and forests Jairam Ramesh, have acknowledged that Himalayan glaciers have been little studied. Why has the Himalayan glaciers issue received such inadequate attention until now? Of the thousands of glaciers in the Indian Himalayas, reliable baseline data exists for relatively few. In the absence of baseline data, it would be crucial to tap the lived experience of people who have lived in the vicinity of glaciers for decades.

Focusing on the erroneous date 2035 alone glosses over the already precarious state of glaciers worldwide, including in many parts of the Himalayas. A study by the World Glacier Monitoring Service in 2005 of 442 glaciers stated that 90% of them were receding. The much respected glaciologist Lonnie Thompson has said recently that of the 800 Himalayan glaciers being monitored, 95% are receding (Guardian, 20 January 2010). That tropical glaciers are receding worldwide are indicative of the fate of subtropical Himalayan glaciers. Ren, Jiawen, et al state: “Many glaciers on the South slope of the central Himalaya have been in retreat, and recently their retreat rate has accelerated … due to reduced precipitation and warmer temperatures” (Annals of Glaciology, vol. 43, no. 1, Sept 2006). Anil Kulkarni, et al’s oft-quoted study of 466 glaciers in the Baspa, Parbati and Chenab basins indicates greater fragmentation of glaciers, and reduction in glacial area by 21% since the mid-20^th century (Current Science, vol. 92, no. 1, 10 Jan 2007). A study of mass balance of glaciers, of “all published Himalayan-Karakoram measurements” shows that overall “they are more negative after 1995”. Though increase in mass loss rate “need not be true of every part of the region … the mass loss rate is consistent with the global average (Jeffrey Kargel, et al, ‘Satellite-era Glacier Changes in High Asia’, AGU conference, December 2009). Dobhal and Mehta’s study of the Dokriani glacier in the Bhagirathi basin says that “The present snout … is continuously retreating, like other glaciers of the Himalaya” (Himalayan Geology, n.d.).

Glaciers have also been thinning at high altitudes. Lonnie Thompson, in an interview to Nature said: “Back in 2006, we drilled three cores in the southwestern Himalayas. At 6,050 metres, where these glaciers reach their highest elevation, we found that … the glaciers are being decapitated. Not only are they retreating up the mountain slopes, but they are thinning from the top down” (Nature Reports Climate Change, 9 July 2009).

This precarious state of glaciers is going to unavoidably worsen because of further global warming in the pipeline, since there is a 25-30 year lag between emissions and warming. As it is, the drying of water sources is being exacerbated by indiscriminate damming of rivers and creation of run-of-the-river projects in the Himalayan states, in the face of considerable resistance from people across these states. All of this is going to worsen the water crisis unfolding for the poor, particularly poor women, in the Himalayas. Any debate on the Himalayan glaciers needs to keep them at its centre.

Rather than view glaciers collectively, it would be more appropriate to view them in a disaggregated way, since impacts on specific glaciers affect specific communities and people dependent on them. Not only is there a compelling need to carry out a comprehensive study of Himalayan glaciers in cooperation with other nations who are part of this rich ecosystem, the process also needs to have the people as a vital and engaged constituent. And the resultant information needs to be in the public domain.

Melting glaciers and the more irregular rainfall patterns in recent years makes the creation of appropriate small and large water harvesting structures absolutely urgent. In which both the government and local organizations have a crucial role to play. The National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NREGS) can be usefully deployed towards this end, but this requires greater political will by local elites and the administration at different levels than they have displayed thus far. There is clearly an urgent need to anticipate and prepare for acute water stress in the Himalayan region and beyond.

Smoke in the Air: Farmer Suicides Continue

The other day I read a comment on another blog complaining that too many bloggers seem to focus only on "bad news."  Well, I, for one, like good news every-bit-as-much as the next fellow.  And my mother taught me early on about the dangers of yelling fire in a crowded theatre.  However (and I've always agreed with her on this point), she also made it clear that in the event that one observes that the theatre is actually on fire, then the correct course of action is to inform someone who has access to a large supply of water! 

Now there are plenty of people who argue that one should first be sure to say something nice about the theatre's decor and the film currently being screened before politely suggesting that some experts somewhere set up a committee to study the problem of fire as it relates to public buildings (no need to single out the theatres, after all).  I suspect these are the people who tend to sit in the PVR Gold Class seats, but what do I know?

Still, like I said, I am not someone who will shy away from good news.  In fact, I had planned to write a breezy Saturday Special today, full of good news like this story that shows Dilli wallas can treat homeless dogs humanely.  And this one, that shows we can even treat homeless human beings humanely, though it may take an order from the Supreme Court to make us do it!

But I canceled that post when I opened Friday's edition of The Hindu to find this story on farmer suicides by the legendary P. Sainath.  Old news,  you say, but the problem is, it only seems to be getting worse. So here it is in a nutshell: according to the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), 199,132 Indian farmers killed themselves in the 12 years from 1997 to 2008. When one considers how often "crimes" like this go unreported, one has to assume the numbers could be much higher. 

An autowalla with whom I frequently ride is fond of saying, "behind every man, there are so many others who depend on him." When you think about what 2,00,000 farmer suicides means in terms of the family members affected, the numbers become very large indeed.

The lion's share of the deaths continue to take place in the five states that comprise the "suicide belt":  Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, and Chhattisgarh.   In Maharashtra alone from 2003-2008, an average of 11 farmers killed themselves every day. In 2008, the last year for which figures are available, more than 16,000 farmers committed suicide, in spite of loan waivers and other government aid programs.  One can only imagine what the 2009 numbers will look like, given the extreme weather we've suffered this year. 

There are many reasons why this news is deeply disturbing.  The first, most obvious, and most important is that the people who are growing the food we eat and the cotton we wear, are, quite literally, dying of desperation.  That should be enough to convince anyone with any sense of human solidarity or  compassion that something serious should have been done a long time ago.

But for those people who need reasons that have something more directly to do with their narrow self interests, here are two additional things to consider.  First, when farmers kill themselves in these numbers, it should be obvious that there are deep problems in our country's system of food production.  In a recent guest post at Youth ki Awaaz, I argued that the food inflation we are suffering is a symptom of an agricultural crisis in this country that is likely to get much worse in coming years.  Farmer suicides are another symptom of that crisis.  And since we all depend on food, we should all be concerned: food security must come first in any country's list of priorities.

Second, it should be clear that suicide in such large numbers is not just an act of desperation; it is also a desperate act of protest. Of course there are many other ways that desperate men and women might choose to protest instead.   The sons of farmers who drink poison may grow up angry enough to pick up a gun when they get a little older.

In Red Sun: Travels in Naxalite Country,  Sudeep Chakravarti argues that most of urban India is ignorant--in many cases willfully so--of the extent to which people are already taking up arms against the Indian state. Urban India may be content to let farmers kill themselves--or even to let them kill police in rural areas.  But violence, like any disease, has a way of spreading, doesn't it?

In an essay like this, it is customary to close with a simple solution.  I don't have one; it's a big, complex problem.  But let me say this: India is capable of achieving great things. We could solve this problem if we chose to.  P. Sainath argues we should expand the NREGS  and cut "the dessert from the menu of the unending corporate free lunch in this country." He points out that the "huge" loan waivers given to farmers in 2008 were dwarfed by tax breaks given to large corporations.  We could also scale back some of our big-budget, high-tech bomber, bomb and space programs. If you want more specific ideas about what to do on the farms, there is no shortage of them either. For a start,  Devinder Sharma and Vandana Shiva both have interesting things to say about how we can improve our agricultural system.

But for me, today, I think it's enough to say this: the theatre is crowded. And I smell smoke.

*****

On another front, it's not too late to sign this on-line petition against new nukes in India. It will be turned in on 30 January.

Latest Word from Copenhagen: Greenwash

I just happened to be up in the middle of the night, sleepless, when the latest word from Copenhagen came in.  It is not good, but it's best we know the real truth, I suppose, than a story designed to make us feel good.  We can watch a film if we want that--like this one, or if you don't care for quality, try something from these guys.

Before you read latest update from the "Legal Adviser to an international environmental organization", don't forget, you can still call or write the President of the United States to demand a real deal.  You can read how my call went here.  And for those of you who would like some more background on the issues, here are a few resources:

If you are confused about "emission intensity" or "carbon intensity", we explain them simply here. For the Green Light Dhaba's introduction to the Copenhagen talks, including our five decade forecast, go here.  For a very good response to a recent piece in the Times of India, check out "Weather ain't the same as climate, Mr. Aiyar." by Suvrat Kher.

If you are reading from outside of India, and wonder how it is possible that we have such low per capita emissions, you might want to check out: "The World is Not Fair and the GDP is Stupid: economics for 9 year olds"; and our photo essays on pedal power and animal power.

Here's one more plug for Beyond Copenhagen ("A collective action against climate change from India"); it has interesting photos and blog posts from Copenhagen. And of course, the Indian Youth Climate Network have all kinds of things going on both on the ground in Delhi and on line.  

Now here's the latest news from Copenhagen. 

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Twenty-four hours from now, you will likely be reading news stories about the final agreement in Copenhagen. Until a few minutes ago, I assumed that those stories would include glowing quotes about the miraculous final deal that 194 nations reached to stop climate change and save the world. Sure some details were going to be left to be worked out later, but leaders would have agreed to a plan that put the world inextricably on a path, they would say, to avoiding dangerous climate change.

But something truly miraculous really did just happen. Someone broke the rules and the story of these talks is now forever changed.

The Guardian has just received a leaked draft internal document from the United Nations Climate Secretariat’s office, where I worked until two weeks ago, that clearly shows that implementing all of the promises leaders have made thus far to reduce emissions clearly puts the world on a path to nothing less than climate disaster.

The debate among most scientists today to identify a global target for greenhouse gas concentrations generally ranges between 450 and 350 parts per million. The 350 ppm camp is gaining support, with some calling for even lower numbers. We are now at about 387 ppm and rising fast, meaning rapid reductions are needed immediately.

Here at the U.N. negotiations, most countries originally had supported an upper limit of 450 ppm, but now more than half of countries support a target of 350 ppm or lower. Unfortunately, the powerful countries like the U.S. still support a global deal that aims at 450 ppm and a temperature rise of no more than 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 Fahrenheit). We are at about 0.8 degrees and rising now.

The deal that world leaders planned to sign tomorrow was likely going to claim that it would result in limits of 450 ppm and a 2 degree temperature rise. But the leaked document tells a very different story. Analysts within the U.N. aggregated all of the promises and pledges made by all countries thus far. They looked at a number of economic scenarios and calculated the result of a deal that assumed all promises made were honored. The analysis shows that our leaders were prepared to sign a deal that condemned the world to a possible concentration of 550 ppm and a global temperature rise of 3 degrees. I don’t have the time to tell you how horrible it would be if the global warming we have now were allowed to almost quadruple. The deal would truly be a global suicide pact.

But now the miracle has happened. Some gutsy U.N. bureaucrat broke the rules. Maybe he or she saw the tears in the many eyes of the international youth delegation that sat down in the middle of the convention center yesterday and read for hours from the millions of names on the petitions they had circulated around the world begging leaders not to leave them a ruined world. Maybe he or she has a child too.

All day our strategists and communications people have been discussing how we are going to overcome the powerful public relations apparatus of the world’s richest nations, ready to spin a Copenhagen story of success with smoke and mirrors. Their job just got a lot tougher.

Of course, as I last wrote, President Obama still has the power to lead the U.S. to a commitment that unlocks a deal that truly addresses the problem in a scientifically defensible way. But few are now expecting that to happen. Instead the overwhelming evidence points to a deal that, no matter what our leaders say, is a total failure to address the severity of the climate problem.

Now we have the proof.

Read the Guardian story and review the analysis yourself here.

This battle to protect our climate is going to go on for many decades. We are going to lose this round. But at least we aren’t going to kid ourselves that we have won and stop fighting.

"Emission Intensity" Explained: small steps are good, but don't count on life being fair!

All over the world, eyes are glazing over at the sound of words like "voluntary reductions in emission intensity." But as silly as they sound, words like this matter. So today we are going to explain why cuts in "emission intensity" or "carbon intensity" are nothing to be afraid of--though they won't likely be enough to solve our problems.  Along the way we are actually going to defend our Minister of Environment and Forests, Mr. Jairam Ramesh--something we never thought we'd have occasion to do, given all the foolish things he's been saying and doing lately.

On Monday, opposition parties walked out of Parlaiment to protest remarks made by Mr. Ramesh regarding India's position at the Copenhagen climate negotiations. Mr. Ramesh has deserved such treatment in the past, but he didn't deserve it this time. The protesting parties said they were against India's proposed unilateral and voluntary 25-per cent reductions in emission intensity by the year 2020.  All tamasha aside, the opposition was basically putting a populist face on business-as-usual policies. I'm all for sincere populism, but the continuation of business-as-usual policies would be a disaster for the whole country, and for poor people most of all.  The cuts in "carbon intensity" or "emission intensity" that Mr. Ramesh is talking about are a good thing; if anything we should be protesting that they don't go deep enough.  

OK, before we go any farther, let me explain this intensity thing.  Agreeing to cuts in carbon intensity basically just means we agree to produce, pollute and consume more efficiently in the future.  In other words, more mileage for the same amount of climate change.   We wouldn't have to stop using motorized vehicles, but we might have to require automobile manufacturers to make more efficient cars.  We wouldn't have to stop using electricity, but we might have to replace worn-out, inefficient power plants with more efficient ones--or we could go one step further and use solar and wind power plants instead.  We could still grow our GDP; in fact we could even produce and pollute more than we do now.  We'd just have to produce less green house gas per unit of GDP.  (And under India's current position, these reduction commitments would not even be legally enforceable, which raises problems will save for another day.)


Since climate change is already affecting our GDP through extreme weather events and failing monsoons, I'm not sure why anyone is even  thinking twice about this one!  Where do you think most of the inflation we are seeing is coming from this year? (Hint: the answer starts with "drought" and ends with a "flood".) More efficient production, consumption and pollution will probably not solve our problems, but it is the least we can do. 

Being more efficient is not as hard as it looks.  Much of this will happen automatically.  Think of all the shop keepers who have replaced their old-style light bulbs with CFL bulbs in recent years.  I hate to break this to you, but that action was not a result of a growing sense of civic duty on the part of small business owners; they've been saving money by lowering their carbon intensity! 

I'm not going to sugar coat this for you.  Cuts like this will not work unless we make a real commitment to limit needless over-consumption. In fact they are not likely to work even then; I'm guessing more radical actions will be required world wide.  And there will be a price tag, even for the relatively modest cuts currently on the bargaining table.  Big Oil and Big Business everywhere in the world will make much of this.  But past experience and credible current research suggests that we can make a "significant impact" without affecting future growth much at all.  

The Chinese are proposing 40-45% cuts in their emissions intensity, and many analysts say they are actually already planning to do better than that. The Chinese cuts do not come without a cost.  But the Chinese government clearly think it will be worth it in the long run. If we can't do 20-25%, we aren't being smart about how we are investing. 

Unfortunately, there is a pretty good chance this approach will simply not be enough to avoid major environmental-agricultural-economic-climate-related problems down the road.  For one thing, it is unlikely that the rich countries are ready to commit to anything like what is required, regardless of what we do.  Of course this is not fair, and the developing world needs to be ready for a long term struggle for climate justice. We'll be looking at issues related to this inequality next week.


But we sometimes forget that there are, in fact, processes in the world that do not respond to what is "politically acceptable" or even "fair".  Thanks to Space Bar for sending over this piece which reminds us that the "significant impacts" that optimistic economists talk about may fall short of what nature will require us to do if we are to avoid widespread social collapse and famine. 

So let's agree to cuts in emission intensity, but let's not kid ourselves into thinking those cuts will be enough.  If we want to leave a world fit for our children and their children, we need to prepare ourselves for the possibility that we will be required to make changes of a different order entirely.  It's not fair, is it?  But that's the way life is.  Any kid will tell you.

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Elsewhere on the web, Annie Zaidi's beautiful "Song, 2" in remembrance of Bhopal.

And RIP Dilip Chitre.

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Want to do and learn more about Climate Change? 

The Indian Youth Climate Network is organizing a Climate Satyagraha this week at the Constitution Club.  Here are some of what is happening:

December 10, 2009 Time: 4:00pm-Hamare Sansadhan
Ms. Supriya Singh, Environment Defence Fund.
Mr. Saurabh, Inner Voice

December 11, 2009 Time: 4:00pm-Science of Climate
Mr. Rakesh Bhatt Scientist
Mr. Dunu Roy Hazard Center
Dr. Arundeep Ahluwalia Head, Department of Geology, Punjab University Chandigarh

December 13, 2009 Time: 4:00pm Hamari Baat
Mr. Bulu Imam Karanpura Campaign
Mr. Vimal Bhai Matu People’s organization
Ms. Manshi Asher Himalaya Niti Abhiyan
Dr. Harshvanti Bisht
Uttarakhand University

December 14, 2009 Time: 5:00pm Unheard Voices

December 15, 2009 Time: 4:00pm Kisan Bhaiyon Se Mulaqat
Mr. Umendra Dutta Kheti Virassat Manch
Mr. Pushpendra Bhai Bundelkhand
Mr. Sanjay Maharishi Shikshantar
Perspectives Team

December 16, 2009 Time: 4:00pm-Debating COP-15
Mr. Gopal Krishna Water Watch Alliance
Mr. Sudhirendra Sharma Water Watch Alliance
Mr. Guman Singh Himalaya Niti Abhiyan
Mr. Devinder Sharma* Policy Analyst
Mr. M.C. Mehta* Environment Lawyer
Mr. Kuldeep Ratnoo d-sector.org

December 17, 2009 Time: 4:00pm-Role of Corporates
Mr. Puneet Sharma Moserbaer

 

For more information, go here.  Or see the FB event page here.

Don't Worry Be Happy: Jairam Ramesh, Thabo Mbeki, and the Problem with Sketchy Science

Yes we are working on Sunday here at the Dhaba, so you know it's something important.  Before we get to the main course, please don't forget to turn in your homework for our Children's Day Challenge! Write a letter to a child about what you will do to stop climate change and you can be published right here at the Green Light Dhaba!  Details at the bottom of this post. I'd love to hear from you by sometime next weekend.

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A few weeks back, Environment minister Jairam Ramesh sent a confidential letter to the PM arguing that India should radically change it's position on climate change.  He said we should abandon our longstanding support of the G-77 group of developing nations and instead adopt important aspects of the US negotiating position. When the letter was leaked, voices from all over the political spectrum cried foul, and Congress quickly distanced itself from the idea.   

Though reasonable people have argued that Ramesh was just being pragmatic, here at the Dhaba, we didn't agree.  We argued that the problem was that his position appeared to be motivated not by a concern over climate change but by a desire to curry favor with the West in return for a permanent seat on the UN security council.  In other words it was more about power than the environment.

Mr. Ramesh appears to be at it again.  Last week, he released a report by Dr. VK Raina that questions the role of climate change in the retreat of the Himalayan glaciers.  Dr. Raina goes so far as to say, "None of our glaciers under monitoring are recording abnormal retreat."

Other scientists, including Rajendra Pachauri, one of the PM's advisers on climate change, rubbished the report, calling it "unscientific" "unsubstantiated" and "self-contradictory".  The Indian Youth Climate Network Blog ran this piece by Devinder Sharma attacking the science and motivations behind the report.

The problem with Dr. Raina's report is not that it flies in the face of most of the science we have up until now; new research sometime does that, and that is how we move forward. The problem is not even that the report appears to contain serious flaws; although these failings could be the result of politically motivated researchers, even good scientists make mistakes. That's why it's so important for research to be transparent and open.  

The problem is that this report was released by the government without first being widely reviewed by independent experts. That's the kind of thing you do when you care more about your political agenda than you do about the truth.  By officially releasing it, the government gives this research, and the questionable science behind it, a credibility and gravity that it does not deserve.  If you don't believe that, take a look at this headline!  (Note who it says is "challenging the global view on Himalayan glaciers.")

We can hope that Mr. Ramesh is just stirring the pot for the sake of...stirring the pot.  Or maybe his political philoshophy can be summed up by the title to Bobby McFerrin's famous song.  But from where I sit, the signs don't look encouraging. His letter to the PM last month--and his response to it in the press--was worrisome.  Now he is promoting sketchy science and a scientist who tells us things are not so bad after all.  Taken together, his actions appear to be consistent with an agenda that prioritizes power and short-sighted development over a commitment to long-term sustainability.

Let's be very clear: politically motivated efforts to twist or deny well-researched scientific ideas can do real harm. The affects of AIDS denialism are well documented.  For example, Thabo Mbeki did not believe that HIV caused AIDS--and he acted on those believes in spite of the overwhelming evidence to the contrary.  As a result, while he was President of South Africa, his government did not respond to that epidemic with appropriate public health measures.  According to research by Harvard University, this cost over 300,000 lives.

We see the cost of climate change denial in the failure of the US to act forcefully on this issue.   Certainly, the job of environmentalists in the US is not made easier by the fact that many people there no longer believe the earth is warming, because short-term weather statistics are being manipulated for political reasons. Similarly, the Himalayan Glaciar report released by Mr. Ramesh will make it more difficult to convince people here of the urgent need for action on climate change.

Denial is so compelling, because so many people have a vested interest in business as usual.  As a result, powerful people will continue to do their best to convince you that we don't need to worry.  Environmentalists need to be open to ideas that challenge our assumptions.  But we don't need politicians who encourage us to foolishly stick our heads in the sand.  We need leaders who respect real science and rigorous debate--and who will have the bravery to take action, even when doing so goes against their own short term interests.

"The 10,000 Year Flood" and Other Fairy Tales: a realistic look at India's extreme weather

In the south this week, hundreds have been killed and millions left homeless by a flood so large that Andhra's Information Minister Geetha Reddy termed it a "possible maximum flood, which happens once in 10,000 years." The agricultural sector has not been spared either: the floods have already damaged at least 20% of India's corn crop.This comes on the heels of what government officials have already been calling the worst drought in 40 years.

Obviously, officials have something to gain by emphasizing how severe these events are; doing so provides them some cover from critics who call into question our disaster preparedness systems. Of course, the critics are right: we should have been better prepared, especially after the the 2008 Bihar flood. Still, there is no denying the fact that the current flooding and drought are extraordinary events. It may even be that this is one of the worst floods in 10,000 years. But anyone who thinks it will take another 10,000 years before we experience another flood like this one is living in a fantasy world.

The problem is that today's extraordinary weather is becoming increasingly... ordinary. There is a reason for this, and it's called climate change. There is a growing consensus that India's monsoons are already being affected by global warming: leading meteorologists and scientists have been piling on the evidence for this in recent months. Climate change is not only weakening our monsoons, but it is leading to increasing numbers of hazardous weather events, which account for many of the 150,000 deaths world-wide that the World Health Organization directly attributes to climate change every year.

In spite of all this evidence, every so often I run across someone who maintains that climate change is not happening, or that it's not something to worry about. Those people remind me of the people who tell you smoking isn't really all that bad for you. There is a reason why there are still a few people around who believe this: the tobacco industry has spent huge amounts of money over the years promoting this idea. They can no longer get away with saying things like, "More doctors smoke Camels" or "not one single case of throat irritation due to smoking"; now their tactics are more subtle, though their intentions are largely the same: confuse, mislead, sell (cigarettes).

Big Oil learned a lot from the tobacco companies. For example, they learned that since the modern media loves to look "balanced," often all you need is one or two skeptical voices in order to call an otherwise well-accepted idea into question. The tobacco industry paid professional "experts" to do their dirty work; it should come as no surprise that the oil industry has been doing the same. Many of the climate skeptics we hear about are, in fact, on the payroll of multinational oil companies. In fact, if you look at the last link, you will see that Fredrick Seitz, sometimes called the "granddaddy of global warming skeptics," actually made a lot of money working for the tobacco industry before he started taking money from the oil industry. It wasn't a hard transition, since the goals of multinational oil companies are so similar to those of the tobacco industry: confuse, mislead, sell (oil)!

Now I want to be clear. No one can tell you for certain that our current drought or the floods in the south are the direct result of climate change, just as nobody can tell you for certain that the lung cancer that killed your friend's uncle was the direct result of the 20 cigarettes he smoked daily. It could have been the Delhi pollution or his bad genes. You never know. But any doctor will tell you that if uncles all over Delhi keep smoking a pack a day, it is only realistic to assume that a certain number of them will die of lung cancer.

A realistic view of extreme weather is likewise simple: if the world keeps warming the way scientists think it will, droughts like this will happen a lot more frequently than every 40 years; and it will not be 10,000 years before we have another flood like the one that is wreaking havoc this week in the south. Take a minute, look look at the news and think about that.

So what should be done? Well, it should be obvious that we need to rethink what we mean by national security. We need to de-prioritize big budget programs like nuclear weapons and high-tech bombers, since, as we have argued previously, these programs are more about national pride than national protection. Of course, our armed forces need to be able to defend our borders and protect us from terrorism. But they should also become the best-trained disaster relief providers in the world. That would be something to be proud of--and it would save lives.

Speaking of "national pride projects" we should use the billion dollars or more that we are currently spending on our space program for more useful things. India doesn't really need a base on the moon or a space ship for space tourists.We need to point our best brains in other directions: the search for sustainable energy sources and agriculture that is drought and flood resistant. Without power or farms, what good is a ticket to the moon? It won't pump our water; it won't feed our families.

Finally, we need to shame the US and other European countries into taking meaningful action on climate change. We can no longer afford to politely beg for scraps from developed world; those scraps will never be enough. We are not asking for charity, only justice. We did not cause this problem: the vast majority of the carbon in the earth's atmosphere was made in the US and Europe. Those countries need to cut their emissions drastically in order to leave us the room we need to develop; and they need to provide us tangible aid as we respond to the crisis that they created.

We should not expect these things to be easy, nor will they happen over night. Still, we must be clear about what needs to be done. If we do not take aggressive steps in the right direction soon, we will be left reeling as we struggle to respond to an ever-worsening series of extreme weather events, inadequate disaster management efforts, failing crops, inflation, more farmer suicides, and even famine.

In other words, realistically speaking, we don't really have any choice but to look the problem in the eye and get to work.

"Naked India"--Will a well-tested bomb make you safer?

I'll admit it: the "Naked India" headline in The Hindu last week got my attention! "The Hindu!" I thought, "What is the world coming to?"

As it turned out, "naked" was used metaphorically; The Hindu was referring to a statement made last week by K. Santhanam, former Chief Adviser of the Defence Research Development Organisation: “We are totally naked vis-À-vis China which has an inventory of 200 nuclear bombs, the vast majority of which are giant H-bombs of power equal to 3 million tonnes of TNT.”

Come to think of it, the widespread use of words like "fizzle" and "dud" in this context suggests another metaphor is at work: nuclear bombs as fire crackers. Between Dasara and Diwali, we'll be exploding a lot of patakas: Atom Bombs, Hydro Bombs...all kinds of bombs. Even I want to use the fire cracker metaphor; there are just so many funny stories I could use.

But there's one problem: nuclear weapons are not "fire crackers". Just this week, I argued that symbols are powerful beasts. Let me expand that: sometimes the power of a symbol or metaphor lies its ability to confuse rather than clarify. The atom bombs and the hydro bombs your child explodes at Diwali are nothing at all like their namesakes--they may take off a finger at most, but they won't incinerate a lakh or crore of human beings.

So let's clarify things a bit. Nobody is saying that India was unable to explode a really big fission bomb. The question is whether we were able to explode an efficient fusion bomb (AKA "hydrogen bomb"). Fusion bombs are much more powerful than fission bombs, but both are huge.

As it turns out, there are a lot of prominent scientists saying the 1998 test was a success. Even those who say the test failed concede it yielded a 25 kiloton explosion. Put in perspective, a 15 kiloton bomb exploded over Hiroshima "yielded" 65,000 deaths. Lest we forget, here is one of them, and it's not for the faint of heart.

I, for one, agree with Mehtab Dere, who writes in the Indian Express that from a national security point of view, 25 kilotons is probably enough to deter China.

In fact, there are a lot of reasons why China would be unlikely to use their bombs on us, even if we lacked any nuclear arsenal at all. Remember that thing called nuclear winter? That's the climate change we used to worry about during the Cold War, before we figured out global warming.

Nobody knows for sure what would happen in a nuclear war, but modern models suggest that even a relatively small exchange involving 50 Hiroshima-sized bombs would have devastating human and environmental consequences. Of course there are doubters, including the late novelist Michael Crichton, who, by the way, also questioned whether global warming was real. (Why we feel compelled to quote science fiction writers in the name of "balanced reporting" is beyond me.)

If Hiroshima-sized bombs over Beijing and the prospect of nuclear winter aren't enough to deter the Chinese, consider the refugee problem they would face in the aftermath of a "successful nuclear attack" on India. (I'm not going to spell this one out for you: I'll rely on your ability to make intelligent inferences about where Indian survivors would go when faced with a non-existent government, radioactive land and water, etc.)

Of course there is no accounting for madmen (please follow that link!), but I can imagine no scenario under which a rational leader would wage war on India, save, perhaps, one. That is the collapse of the global economic and political order and the widespread starvation and breakdown of civil society that could very well follow from such a collapse.

There were many problems with Jared Diamond's book Collapse (it was unnecessarily long-winded for one), but it argued two points quite clearly. First, many powerful societies have collapsed at the peak of their power for any number of reasons-- and often with horrible human consequences. Second: because of the way we are consuming resources and destroying our environment, this could happen to us if we are not careful.

Well-tested hydrogen bombs and major increases to our defense budget will not make us safe. It's time we put aside national pride for long enough to figure this out: real security for us and our children will only come if we remake our society into something capable of sustaining life, not destroying it.

Note: I just got word that the India Youth Climate Network and others are organizing a "Delhi Rally" on October 1 and 2nd to protest "India's reckless nuclear policies..." If you are in Delhi, this will be the place to be. For details, check the INCN website. And do spread the word.