Conflict/Dispossession
From Vice.com: “When we go to private hospitals outside, they immediately tell us that the only way to survive is to leave the area. But the doctors here tell us there’s nothing wrong. Are they saying doctors outside this area are all mad? Are the researchers who’ve declared this place unfit mad?” asks Farah Sheikh….
Read More about Mahul, Mumbai: Unfit for human habitation
CLIMATE CRISIS
Chirag Dhara writes: There is no disputing how urgently India – and the rest of the world – need to clean up its air. Unfortunately, therein lies a cruel twist. A rapid decontaminating of the air of aerosol pollution –assuming it was possible– itself raises the prospect of serious health consequences. The reason: how aerosols interact with climate….
Read More about Cleaning up India’s air pollution — damned if we do, damned if we don’t?
Development/Growth
From IndiaSpend.com: Fifteen of the top 20 most polluted cities in the world are located in India, according to an analysis of air quality in several cities around the world by IQAir Group. Gurugram, in Haryana, topped the list with an average annual particulate matter (PM 2.5) quality of 135 g/m3 (micrograms/cubic metre), in 2018….
Read More about Fifteen of the 20 most polluted cities in the world are in India: New report
Education/Awareness
From The Sunday Guardian: The Delhi metropolitan area has one of the world’s highest concentrations of population, and suffocating people here on an annual basis should be treated as a crime against humanity, especially when it can be controlled. Arvind Kumar writes on the connection between USAID, Monsanto and Delhi’s nightmarish annual air pollution spike….
Read More about USAID, Monsanto and the real reason behind Delhi’s horrific smoke season
ALTERNATIVES
Sunita Narain, India’s best-known environmentalist, says the environment challenges we confront-like Delhi’s extreme air pollution-are progenies of “a conspiracy of silence”. “It is a conspiracy because you don’t want the people to know (the harmful effects of environmental pollution),” says Narain, whose new book “Conflicts of Interest” gives a personal account of her green battles….
Read More about ‘We’re facing a conspiracy of silence’: Sunita Narain
Development/Growth
Delhi’s killer smog has been blamed on many things, but rarely on highly polluting industrial fuels like petcoke. India is the world’s biggest importer of this dirtiest of fuels, banned in most countries. Last month, the Supreme Court banned it in the NCR; but given the big players involved, who will ensure the ban’s implemented?…
Read More about Spotlight: Is ‘petcoke’ the hidden villain in Delhi’s pollution crisis?Culture/Cognition
The short film Carbon focuses on global warming and takes a look at what the future could hold for us if we don’t act today. The Nawazuddin Siddiqui, Prachi Desai and Jackky Bhagnani starrer deals with serious environmental issues like Global Warming & pollution and their impact on our world. Watch the full movie here….
Read More about Carbon: A Hindi short film set in 2067Conflict/Dispossession
From Truthout.org: This superbly researched 2015 paper explains why China’s unfolding environmental crisis is so horrific, so much worse than “normal” capitalism almost everywhere else, and why the government is incapable of suppressing pollution even from its own industries. It should serve as a warning for India, whose official policies increasingly mimic the ‘China model’….
Read More about Spotlight: China’s communist-capitalist ecological apocalypse
A mega power plant would have eliminated Vilambur's strong local economy that includes charcoal producers
Dhruv Malhotra © Wilson
ALTERNATIVES
Keith Schneider writes: It is almost impossible for a single place to embody the full array of emerging factors around climate, carbon, water, finance, culture and cleaner technology that have utterly changed how India and the world view the value and risks of coal. But if such a place exists, it’s Vilambur in Tamil Nadu….
Read More about Ground Report: India’s slow but sure shift away from coalCLIMATE CRISIS
From Friends of the Earth: The 2015 Indonesian forest fires, started by farmers and palm-oil companies to clear land for plantation, lasted for months and caused massive air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions, at one point releasing more carbon dioxide than the entire U.S. economy, and causing an estimated 100,000 premature deaths in the region….
Read More about Historic verdict in Indonesia’s fight against deforestation
Illustration by Jasper Rietman
Bookshelf
Florence Williams writes: Unfortunately for city dwellers, the closer we live to roads, the higher our risk of autism, stroke and cognitive decline in ageing, although the exact reasons haven’t been teased out. Scientists suspect it has something to do with fine particles causing tissue inflammation and altering gene expression in the brain’s immune cells….
Read More about Warning: living in a city could seriously damage your health
Health/Safety
There were 1.1 million premature deaths in India due to long-term exposure to pollutants. While China registered slightly higher figures, it has now acted against this hazard—the situation in India, in contrast, is getting worse. The highest number of premature deaths globally due to ozone is also in India. Might all this qualify as genocide?…
Read More about Darryl D’Monte: Does India’s refusal to tackle air pollution amount to genocide?
Health/Safety
Gary Haq writes: The health impacts of air pollution are well documented; but now, new evidence suggests a link between air pollution and dementia and Alzheimer’s disease, with exposure to poor air quality equivalent to passively smoking six cigarettes a day. Toxic air has been blamed for more road traffic crashes from pollutants distracting drivers….
Read More about Take a deep breath – here’s what 2016 revealed about the deadly dangers of air pollution
Representative pic
Development/Growth
Catch News reports: Chhattisgarh’s Janjgir-Champa region, once famous for paddy cultivation, is now emerging as the state’s power hub with several power plants coming up in the area during the recent years. While fuelling the state’s economic growth, dust and ash emitted from these power plants are turning thousands of local people blind from cataract….
Read More about Power plants are making thousands go blind in Chhattisgarh
Health/Safety
The Hindu reports: Air pollution could have killed at least 600,000 Indians in 2012, worldwide because they were exposed to fine particulate matter (PM2.5) that may have aggravated or been directly responsible for cardiovascular diseases and lung cancer according to the WHO. India comes just behind China–which witnessed an estimated 800,000 deaths, says the study….
Read More about Air pollution could have killed 600,000 Indians in 2012, says WHO study
Health/Safety
According to new data from the World Health Organization, India now ranks in the top ten of the top 50 most polluted countries on earth, although it does rank better than many of its closest neighbors. Meanwhile, data from NASA show parts of the Indo-Gangetic plain to be some of the planet’s most polluted places….
Read More about India now among the world’s top ten most polluted countries
CLIMATE CRISIS
CoalSwarm’s new report details how India has a total of 243 GW of coal plants under development, threatening to derail its renewable energy ambitions, leading to either locked-out renewables or stranded coal plants. It would push the country towards more expensive and underutilized coal plants at the expense of lower cost and cleaner renewable energy….
Read More about Collision course: The incompatibility of India’s coal and renewable strategiesALTERNATIVES
The Centre’s recent directive to state-owned power generation firms to stop coal imports and instead buy domestic coal, saw skeptical voices warning against seeing it as a sign of new commitment to reduce coal consumption. However, there’s good reason to the hope that India may be moving away from coal, irrespective of the government’s intent….
Read More about No thanks to the govt, but coal may be on its way out in India anyway
CLIMATE CRISIS
Two years of NDA government have meant a mixed bag for environmental governance in India, according to a performance review by the non-profit Centre for Science and Environment, While there was commendable progress on pollution control and waste management, forest governance took on a more industry-centric approach and the Paris Agreement was a missed opportunity….
Read More about Report card: Environmental governance under NDA government
CLIMATE CRISIS
India has an extreme air pollution problem, which kills up to 400,000 people every year. This pollution, made up of fine particles called aerosols, also has the effect of cooling the local climate by reflecting or absorbing sunlight before it reaches the ground. It is feasible that India’s pollution problem has been “hiding” extreme heat spikes….
Read More about The hidden connection between air pollution and heat spikes: India’s lethal double bind
