Wars, Air-Conditioners and Climate Change – #138
News of the week
Once again, the unspeakable overlapped with the everyday.
Last week, Israel attacked Iran, saying the latter was close to acquiring nuclear weapons.
The claim is farcical, as a set of media houses from CNN to The Daily Show have pointed out.
“Not only was Iran not actively pursuing a nuclear weapon, it was also up to three years away from being able to produce and deliver one to a target of its choosing,” wrote CNN. At the Daily Show, Jon Stewart played old videos from 2012, 2015 and 2018 where Netanyahu had similarly claimed Iran was days and weeks away from developing a nuclear weapon. “Netanyahu talks about Israel getting nukes the way I talk about the Knicks winning a title,” he said.
And yet, the world once again teeters at the edge of a conflict that could go global. As CNN reported, Israel cannot destroy Iran’s nuclear facilities without American B-52s and the bombs they carry. If the US steps in, will China, which has so far condemned Israel’s actions and said it wanted to be a peace broker, but needs to resist US encirclement, step in as well? Ours is a time of rising xenophobia and insularity, where countries increasingly see international relations as a zero-sum game. Trump, as we know, threatened to slap sanctions even on the EU. The EU, for its part, is backing Israel, saying the country is doing the dirty work for others. The Global South, fissured as ever, is incapable of speaking in a single voice. In all, barring a sudden attack of sanity, the world is in for economic shocks and mass suffering.
Wars don’t just push up oil prices, take lives and batter economies, they also scar the planet. “According to the UK-based Conflict and Environment Observatory, global military activity is responsible for 5.5 per cent of greenhouse gas emissions,” said Business Standard last week. “If treated as a country, this would place it fourth after China, the US, and India.”
“A single Tomahawk missile detonation emits around 800 kg of CO2,” wrote the newspaper. “Fighter jets like the F-15 can burn 6,000 litres of fuel per hour, releasing over 15 tonnes of CO2, many times more than a car emits in a year. One week of heavy bombardment, such as in the Iraq War or Gaza 2023, can equal the emissions of 100,000 passenger vehicles annually… Between October 2023 and January 2025, the Israel-Gaza war released an estimated 1.89 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent.” Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, it added, has generated 230 million tonnes of CO2, comparable to Belgium’s emissions.
The history of our species, however, is a history of selective attention. Political economy so often determines what gets discussed and what remains unspeakable. So too, here. Military emissions don’t get discussed. “Under pressure from the US, the Kyoto Protocol exempted military reporting,” wrote Business Standard. “The Paris Agreement only allows voluntary disclosure. Most countries don’t report military emissions, and those that do under-report significantly. As global militarisation rises, this emissions blind spot undermines climate commitments.”
With the world teetering on the edge of conflagration, other developments felt relatively inconsequential. The US and China agreed on a trade truce over rare earths, which, however, leaves thorny issues like military uses untouched. This unresolved conflict threatens a more comprehensive deal, wrote Reuters.
Back home, the Indian government said AC manufacturers will have to set default temperatures at 24°C and that temperature settings below 20°C will be barred. It might even be a welcome step. ACs, as a slew of media reports have described in recent years, are a poor solution to heat stress. The hot air they eject, as this Washington Post deep dive had shown some years ago, makes the surrounding areas hotter yet. The pressure to keep prices low results in less-efficient models outselling cleaner ones. Power consumption, on the whole, goes up, and India ends up burning even more coal. A negative feedback loop, in essence.
This year too, as temperatures soared in Northern India, BSES (a local discom) urged consumers to optimise energy usage, particularly in air conditioning. “AC usage can account for nearly 50% of a residential or commercial unit’s energy costs, and recommended setting the thermostat to 24°C, which can reduce electricity consumption by 6% for every 1°C increase,” wrote Economic Times. For all these reasons, temperature curbs are welcome. And yet, this is still an exercise in selective attention. India continues to chop trees; underfund mass transit resulting in people buying bikes and cars; ignores all the processes which, by pushing up solar tariffs, prolong the life of coal; under-invests in alternative cooling technologies.
In other energy sector news, India met a record peak power demand of 241 GW on June 9. While the government claimed the peak had been managed “with zero shortage” — a feat supported by the addition of 34 GW of power generation capacity in FY25, with renewable energy contributing 29.5 GW, said officials — the run-up to 241 GW saw reports of long power cuts from large states like Odisha, Maharashtra and Uttar Pradesh. Continuing with familiar arcs, Delhi’s air quality is still bad. There is one more oil-well blowout in Assam, this time in the state’s Rudrasagar oil field in Bhatiyapara near Sibsagar. The well was being run by a subcontractor of ONGC called SK Petro Services. A report by Yes Securities provided a snapshot into India’s biofuel sector. Ethanol blending is going well — it has climbed to 18% in petrol. Solid biofuels are gaining ground in industries as substitutes for coal and furnace oil. Compressed biogas, however, is still struggling.
India also released its draft solar waste rules. Once these come into force, producers and bulk consumers will have to ensure end-of-life management of solar equipment.
“They are required to channel waste only through registered dismantlers and recyclers,” wrote ET. “The CPCB has emphasised that Extended Producer Responsibility will apply to producers involved in manufacturing, importing, or selling solar PV modules or panels in India.” The CPCB will accept public comments till June 29, 2025.
In non-energy news, north-east India has seen torrential rain in May, the highest in recorded history since 1901. “Triggered by a deep depression over Bangladesh, the rains shattered records, with excess rainfall ranging from 427 per cent of the normal in Assam to a staggering 1,102 per cent of the normal in Mizoram,” wrote Frontline.
“The rains kept pouring all night, without letting off even for a moment. It was the same the next day,” Mina, a resident of Tezpur, Assam, told the magazine about the days and nights of May 30 and 31 when “the north-eastern region was battered by relentless rains, triggering floods and massive damage. Places like Sohra (aka Cherrapunji) and Silchar recorded a staggering amount of rainfall—470 and 420 mm, respectively—within 24 hours.”
Elsewhere, it emerged that MSC, the owner of Elsa 3, the ship which sank off Kerala’s coast, has links to Adani. One reason why the political outcry on the incident, despite the ship carrying dangerous cargo and oil, has been relatively muted. And India’s auto industry could face disruptions in electric vehicle production if the delays in rare earth magnet shipments from China persist. “Nearly 30 import requests from Indian companies had been endorsed by the Indian government by the end of May 2025, but none have yet been approved by Chinese authorities,” wrote Economic Times.
In the days that followed, Business Standard followed through with an optimistic report saying: “India’s solution to the ongoing crisis surrounding rare earth magnets may well be on track, as Hyderabad-based Midwest Advanced Materials (MAM) is all set to produce the country’s first rare earth magnets by December from its 500-tonne-per-annum facility in Hyderabad.” One Googles a bit more, however, and finds India’s demand for rare earth magnets stands at 53,748 tonnes; and that the Indian PSU mining rare earths is struggling due to weak government support.
Climate Longreads of the Week
One of the Dreamliners That Gave a Boeing Manager Nightmares Just Crashed (Prospect)
The troubled waters of Mumbai’s Mithi river: There seems to be a political tussle over control of the BMC in the drive against the Mithi clean-up scam (Frontline)
Can Biochar be India’s missing link to Carbon Capture? (CarbonCopy)
Can parametric insurance protect India’s most vulnerable from Climate Risks? (CarbonCopy)
Can LNG replace coal in India? (IEEFA).
Book of the Week
We are reposting an old book this time around. Peter Robison’s Flying Blind: The 737 Max Tragedy and the Fall of Boeing. At one level, this is an account of how Boeing went off the rails. At a deeper level, this is an account of too strong a focus on financial metrics — and on the share price — resulted in Boeing underestimating the centrality of engineering to its business. A real cautionary tale for our times.
Here is a review.
PS: Also see the prospect essay hyperlinked in Longreads.