Paradox Country — Issue #49
An award ceremony by the Maharashtra government failed to prepare for the heatwave, resulting in 11 people dying from heatstroke. There is a paradox here.
News of the Week
As the news goes, last week has been lack-lustre. Scanning headlines, we see old, familiar processes playing out as ever. The heat wave is starting to intensify again. Planners – in the government and outside – have to prepare accordingly. One set of planners – folks who planned an award ceremony for the Maharashtra government – failed to do so. Going by news reports, a crowd of lakhs sat under a scorching sun for over five hours. So far, eleven people in the audience have died from heat stroke and dehydration. Another 50 had to be taken to hospitals. In all, anywhere between 120 and 600 people suffered from health issues like “dehydration, chest pain, rise in blood sugar level among other health problems,” as The Times Of India wrote.
An official pointed out, as the Times of India wrote that the timing of the outdoor event went against the heat action plan proposed for each district in the summer. That is just the start. People complained that the event planners hadn’t made adequate arrangements for water. Further commentary – on dismal state capacity, on disregard for life, our ability to dismiss (and normalise) unnatural weather patterns – feels superfluous.
There is a paradox here. India is moving faster on some climate fronts than others. For one, the country’s capex on renewables has overtaken its expenditure on fossil fuels. Last week too, we saw this trend continue to play out. In FY22-23, India sold over a million electric vehicles – a trebling since the year before. Two-wheelers accounted for 62% of these sales. Electric 3-wheelers accounted for another 34%, with four-wheelers (this is almost entirely cars; buses account for just 0.16% of sales) accounting for the rest.
The government continues to talk up its nuclear energy plans. It wants to install 20GW of nuclear capacity by 2030 – around three times the current capacity of 6.78GW. Some of the details, however, remain cloudy. This report in Economic Times, for instance, quotes Jitendra Singh, India’s science and technology minister, as saying “nuclear installations to be developed under joint ventures with PSUs”.
What does this mean? In the past, India has seen NTPC tie up with NPCIL. More such alliances – where NPCIL brings in knowhow and PSUs bring in the cash -- seem to be on the cards. This push, which comes at a time when countries like Germany are choosing renewables over nuclear, speaks of India’s compulsions. More on this soon.
The country is pivoting faster on energy than on fronts like adaptation and mitigation. Given the policy backing received by hydrocarbons and renewables, much of this paradox seems to be about markets responding faster to climate change than the state.
This outpacing of the state needs to be understood. Is it stuck in an outdated world where weakening of, say, environmental protections will attract investors? Or has the state been captured by lobbies, and is simply active wherever more money is at stake? There is, for sure, far more money in the energy transition than the implementation of heat action plans.
Last week also saw a close fisking of the country’s latest tiger numbers. “Tigers over the past 50 years have increased both in numbers, and even in some cases areas occupied by them, in the western half of the country while their numbers, and occupancy, have collapsed entirely in the eastern half save for a couple of exceptions,” wrote Raza Kazmi. The report, which says tiger populations have completely collapsed across north-east India, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Odisha, Telangana and Andhra Pradesh (except for three parks in Assam; one in Odisha; and one spanning Andhra and Telangana), makes for very grim reading. “This is in glaring contrast to the situation in 1972 when the tigers (numbering 1827 according to the 1972 census) were more-or-less evenly distributed across the length and breadth of India,” he writes.
In other news, the Adani group is showing small signs of revival. Post-Hindenburg, it went slow on fresh projects and acquisitions. Some of that is changing now. In early March, the group submitted an EoI for the Great Nicobar project. Now comes the news that a JV between it and Flemingo Group is bidding for Future Group’s retail assets. In parallel, however, the tribal council of Great Nicobar has withdrawn its no objection certificate for the proposed city (and transhipment port) project for the island.
On the international front, the G7 group of developed economies arrived at a consensus to accelerate the phase-out of all unabated fossil fuels. While the agreement, which came through a meeting of energy and environment ministers of G7 countries in Sapporo, Japan, is historic in using consistent language to address all fossil fuels, without clearly specified timelines it feels more like a signal of intent than a plan of action. This newsletter has, in previous issues, brought attention towards how developed countries have begun rolling out the red carpet for low-carbon technologies and "clean" businesses in a bid to bring manufacturing back to their shores. One wonders how last week's consensus will manifest in policy. Given how Europe's proposed carbon border tax has become a cause for anxiety in India, one can't help but also wonder about the imminent implications for India's export-oriented industries.
Climate Long-Reads of the Week
Who’ll finance Indian infrastructure after the Adani scandal?(Bloomberg)
The links between Indonesia’s deforestation and Xinjiang (Al Jazeera)
Gas can’t compete with wind, solar and storage, even in world’s biggest market (Renew)
The largest habitat on Earth is finally getting protection. We need to read, again and again, about the High Seas Treaty. Change is possible. The mass extinction of species is not a foregone conclusion yet. The treaty is a call to arms (Vox).
How Indonesia Used Chinese Industrial Investments to Turn Nickel into the New Gold (Carnegie)
The illusion of a trillion trees (FT takes on this modern-day scourge of large afforestation projects).
India Is Encouraging the Heatwaves That Will Cripple It (Bloomberg)
Massive mosquito factory in Brazil aims to halt dengue (Nature)
Bangladesh is developing two new laws that might better protect the country’s forests (and trees outside forests).
Book of the Week
We just finished reading Full Tilt by Dervla Murphy. This book describes her cycle ride from Ireland to Delhi – through the Balkans, Persia, Afghanistan and Pakistan – in 1963. The book leaves one agog, partly due to Murphy’s understated (even good-humoured) descriptions of attacks from dogs, strange men and excruciating weather, and partly due to the lost world that she describes.
This trip was taken at a time when the Balkans were yet to splinter. The clergy was yet to annex Iran. Afghanistan was yet to be invaded by Russia (and then the Americans). And the Buddha statues still stood in Bamiyan. Why this book? Because, as this tribute to Murphy says: “She describes travelling through countries with little or no money, without knowing the language nor what or who she would encounter. There are bad people, but most are welcoming and as curious as she is, opening their homes and cafes to this Irishwoman on a bicycle who has made her way to the mountains of Afghanistan or Pakistan. Her books are reminders that most people are fundamentally good.”