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Saving the world from self-destruction
First, a couple of definitions. What is a Greenhouse? A Green house is a building where plants are cultivated under a glass or plastic roof. Greenhouse gases are gases in an atmosphere that absorb and emit radiation. The main greenhouse gases in the earth’s atmosphere are water vapour, carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide and ozone. Greenhouse gases greatly affect the temperature of the earth. Increasing concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere can cause an unprecedented rise in global temperature leading to the melting of ice. Loss from the Greenland Ice Sheet has increased three-fold just in the last decade. Snow cover is decreasing in the Himalayas that may ultimately hurt rivers like Ganga and Jamuna. Since about 1750, human activity has increased the concentration of carbon dioxide. Presently carbon dioxide concentrations are several score higher than at the start of the Industrial Revolution. The main sources of Greenhouse gases due to human activities are: burning of fossil fuels like coal, fuel oil, flaring gas industrially, deforestation, shipping and air transport. Carbon dioxide formulation in the atmosphere has gone up by about 30% since 1990. There has been a sharp acceleration in carbon dioxide emission since 2000 (more than 3% increase per year). When a factory uses coal as fuel, there is a lot of carbon dioxide emission involved. Coal is used to produce steel. The manufacture of steel, in the circumstances is to add to carbon dioxide emission indirectly. Since steel is a component in the manufacture of cars and trucks, the more these transport vehicles are built, the more the greenhouse emission. According to the U.S. Bureau of Transit statistics, there were 250,844,644 registered passenger vehicles in the U.S in 2006. In China the number of privately-owned motor vehicles rose to 35 million in 2007 from 22 million a year earlier. In 1900 the total number of passenger car was just 4,192. According to Ward’s Motor Vehicle Facts and Figures, world-wide there were 485,954,000 cars registered apart from 185,404,000 trucks and buses. One can easily imagine how much carbon dioxide must have been generated in the process of their manufacture, even conceding the automobile technology has almost totally reduced carbon emission in their running. China, once known as the kingdom of bicycles, has now over taken Japan to become the world’s second largest auto market after the United States. In India though, fleet owners, according to available information, are not so enthusiastic about switching over to new technology trucks offering better fuel economy because of high prices. About one third of India’s consumption is accounted for by the Transport Sector. According to the World Bank, 53% of India’s commercial energy demand is met by coal. India’s current coal-based capacity of 81,355 MW emits 540 million tonnes of carbon dioxide which is 60% of the country’s total carbon emission. What India is planning to do is to upgrade old coal-based power plants. Already Canada, France and the U.S have signed MOU’s with India for transfer of clean coal technology and it is learnt that Tatas, along with the Jindal Group are working with international partners to produce oil through coal-to- liquid technology. At the lower middle and poor class level this has no relevance. In villages it is common to use wood for cooking and other water-heating purposes, as has been the practice for centuries. It will require an enormous effort to change rural practices to meet current demand for lowering carbon emission. Villages will have to be supplied with gas or cheap electricity which, at the current level of economy, would be next to
impossible. Actually, Indian per capita carbon emission is almost 20% less than that of the U.S and ten times lower than that of European Union, so it does not have to feel guilty on the issue of carbon emission. Indeed, on a per capita basis the emission level is still more tolerable than imagined. But this is not an issue to quarrel over. It is not just an issue of which country produces more carbon dioxide, whether on an overall or per capita basis. The issue is for all countries to see that total emissions across the world do not end up with enough to raise temperature by an addition two degrees C. Even a little higher rise in temperature by three to four degrees C would parch continents, turning farmlands into deserts. Half of all living species could become extinct, untold millions of people would be displaced and entire nations drowned by the sea. Several islands like Andaman & Nicobar or the Maldives, to mention just two, could cease to exist. It would be a pralaya of a kind that is talked about in India as the end of the yuga. India cannot be accused of causing high level emission for the simple reason that in per capita terms, it consumes energy less than one twentieth of that of the U.S. But for all that, if India really wants to reduce its carbon emission by 20%, it has to resort to other forms of energy production. India can invest in nuclear power except that the cost per kilowatt of nuclear power is about six times that of power derived from coal-fired plants. How then is one to bell this particular cat? India can take the solar thermal route which seems so obvious considering that it has round-the-year sunshine except that the capital cost for producing the same amount of electricity from solar plants would be about 12 to 15 times that of using the coal route. In either case it is production cost that determines feasibility. There has been talk of demanding that rich countries should make financial and technological transfers to developing countries to enable them achieve low-level carbon emission conditions. That can’t be called charity. It is in the interests of developed countries to help India so that the entire world can benefit by it. By helping India, the world helps itself. India is doing its best to fulfill its responsibilities. It is planning to spend as much as 0.1 per cent of its GDP to promote solar energy and wind power is growing at the rate of 26% annually since 2000. It is a country aware of its duties and responsibilities. Helping it financially and technology-wise would, in the long run, benefits the whole world. Isn’t that something to ponder over?
First, a couple of definitions. What is a Greenhouse? A Green house is a building where plants are cultivated under a glass or plastic roof. Greenhouse gases are gases in an atmosphere that absorb and emit radiation. The main greenhouse gases in the earth’s atmosphere are water vapour, carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide and ozone. Greenhouse gases greatly affect the temperature of the earth. Increasing concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere can cause an unprecedented rise in global temperature leading to the melting of ice. Loss from the Greenland Ice Sheet has increased three-fold just in the last decade. Snow cover is decreasing in the Himalayas that may ultimately hurt rivers like Ganga and Jamuna. Since about 1750, human activity has increased the concentration of carbon dioxide. Presently carbon dioxide concentrations are several score higher than at the start of the Industrial Revolution. The main sources of Greenhouse gases due to human activities are: burning of fossil fuels like coal, fuel oil, flaring gas industrially, deforestation, shipping and air transport. Carbon dioxide formulation in the atmosphere has gone up by about 30% since 1990. There has been a sharp acceleration in carbon dioxide emission since 2000 (more than 3% increase per year). When a factory uses coal as fuel, there is a lot of carbon dioxide emission involved. Coal is used to produce steel. The manufacture of steel, in the circumstances is to add to carbon dioxide emission indirectly. Since steel is a component in the manufacture of cars and trucks, the more these transport vehicles are built, the more the greenhouse emission. According to the U.S. Bureau of Transit statistics, there were 250,844,644 registered passenger vehicles in the U.S in 2006. In China the number of privately-owned motor vehicles rose to 35 million in 2007 from 22 million a year earlier. In 1900 the total number of passenger car was just 4,192. According to Ward’s Motor Vehicle Facts and Figures, world-wide there were 485,954,000 cars registered apart from 185,404,000 trucks and buses. One can easily imagine how much carbon dioxide must have been generated in the process of their manufacture, even conceding the automobile technology has almost totally reduced carbon emission in their running. China, once known as the kingdom of bicycles, has now over taken Japan to become the world’s second largest auto market after the United States. In India though, fleet owners, according to available information, are not so enthusiastic about switching over to new technology trucks offering better fuel economy because of high prices. About one third of India’s consumption is accounted for by the Transport Sector. According to the World Bank, 53% of India’s commercial energy demand is met by coal. India’s current coal-based capacity of 81,355 MW emits 540 million tonnes of carbon dioxide which is 60% of the country’s total carbon emission. What India is planning to do is to upgrade old coal-based power plants. Already Canada, France and the U.S have signed MOU’s with India for transfer of clean coal technology and it is learnt that Tatas, along with the Jindal Group are working with international partners to produce oil through coal-to- liquid technology. At the lower middle and poor class level this has no relevance. In villages it is common to use wood for cooking and other water-heating purposes, as has been the practice for centuries. It will require an enormous effort to change rural practices to meet current demand for lowering carbon emission. Villages will have to be supplied with gas or cheap electricity which, at the current level of economy, would be next to
impossible. Actually, Indian per capita carbon emission is almost 20% less than that of the U.S and ten times lower than that of European Union, so it does not have to feel guilty on the issue of carbon emission. Indeed, on a per capita basis the emission level is still more tolerable than imagined. But this is not an issue to quarrel over. It is not just an issue of which country produces more carbon dioxide, whether on an overall or per capita basis. The issue is for all countries to see that total emissions across the world do not end up with enough to raise temperature by an addition two degrees C. Even a little higher rise in temperature by three to four degrees C would parch continents, turning farmlands into deserts. Half of all living species could become extinct, untold millions of people would be displaced and entire nations drowned by the sea. Several islands like Andaman & Nicobar or the Maldives, to mention just two, could cease to exist. It would be a pralaya of a kind that is talked about in India as the end of the yuga. India cannot be accused of causing high level emission for the simple reason that in per capita terms, it consumes energy less than one twentieth of that of the U.S. But for all that, if India really wants to reduce its carbon emission by 20%, it has to resort to other forms of energy production. India can invest in nuclear power except that the cost per kilowatt of nuclear power is about six times that of power derived from coal-fired plants. How then is one to bell this particular cat? India can take the solar thermal route which seems so obvious considering that it has round-the-year sunshine except that the capital cost for producing the same amount of electricity from solar plants would be about 12 to 15 times that of using the coal route. In either case it is production cost that determines feasibility. There has been talk of demanding that rich countries should make financial and technological transfers to developing countries to enable them achieve low-level carbon emission conditions. That can’t be called charity. It is in the interests of developed countries to help India so that the entire world can benefit by it. By helping India, the world helps itself. India is doing its best to fulfill its responsibilities. It is planning to spend as much as 0.1 per cent of its GDP to promote solar energy and wind power is growing at the rate of 26% annually since 2000. It is a country aware of its duties and responsibilities. Helping it financially and technology-wise would, in the long run, benefits the whole world. Isn’t that something to ponder over?
:- Dr. M. V. Kamath
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