Shankar Sharma Archives

Conserve/Resist

Kaiga nuclear plant expansion: Expect body blow for Western Ghats biodiversity

5th March 2019

From Down to Earth: The biodiversity of the Western Ghats, already under a lot of anthropogenic pressure, will suffer even more if the expansion of the Kaiga Nuclear Power Plant, goes ahead. That this will be done for generating power through a technology that has several alternative and much benign options is even more ironical….

Development/Growth

Tejal Kanitkar on the contradiction at the heart of India’s National Energy Policy

6th January 2018

From Newsclick: Prof. Tejal Kanitkar, who heads the Centre for Climate Change and Sustainability Studies at TISS, says that while the government’s National Energy Policy claims it will provide 24×7 electricity to the entire nation by 2022, this lies in contradiction with the mode through which they plan ensure its distribution; that is, the market….

Development/Growth

Can India afford an economy obsessed with GDP growth rate?

14th July 2016

Conventional economic analysts argue that achieving adequate human development indicators require a country’s economy has to grow continuously at an appreciable rate; but, a densely populated and resource-constrained society such as ours cannot afford to ignore the implications of high energy and material consumption (which will be a consequence of high growth of the economy)….

ALTERNATIVES

No thanks to the govt, but coal may be on its way out in India anyway

30th June 2016

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….

CLIMATE CRISIS

The true cost of the obsession with GDP growth

30th May 2016

Shankar Sharma writes: It’s evident that an economic policy focusing on high GDP growth rate has not only not resulted in the elimination of poverty, but is certainly leading to accelerated depletion of our natural resources and to the unacceptable level of pollution of land, water and air, while contributing to the global warming phenomenon….

CLIMATE CRISIS

India’s INDCs and the road to Paris – 3

13th November 2015

(Note: In this series of posts, we take a closer look at whether India’s Intended Nationally Determined Contribution (INDC) ahead of the Paris climate talks. In this third installment, we present comments by three independent observers that critically analyse India’s climate commitment. Also read: Part 1 and Part 2 of the series) “India has low per capita emission only thanks…

CLIMATE CRISIS

High GDP growth centered paradigm and GHG emissions

11th October 2015

Shankar Sharma, ORF Energy News Monitor Whereas many conventional economic analysts argue that in order to have adequate human development index the country’s economy has to grow continuously at an appreciable rate, a densely populated and resource constrained society such as ours cannot afford to ignore the implications of high energy / material consumption (which…

CLIMATE CRISIS

A ‘People’s Report’ on Climate Change in Karnataka

14th June 2015

Shankar Sharma On World Environment Day, Karnataka’s chief minister Siddharamaiah released a people’s report on the action plan needed to ‘mitigate’ and ‘adapt’ to Climate Change issues in the state of Karnataka. This report was prepared because of the efforts of Karnataka State Pollution Control Board. The report is termed as “people’s report” because it is based…

CLIMATE CRISIS

The IMF’s “shocking” estimate of fossil fuel costs: There’s more to the story

4th June 2015

Sajai Jose Credit: CGP Grey/Flickr, CC-BY 2.0 Recently, when an International Monetary Fund research paper revealed that the actual cost of fossil fuel usage for 2015 was a staggering US$ 5.3 trillion (approx. 340 lakh crore rupees), it made headlines worldwide, though it went largely unreported in India. What accounts for the bulk of this figure are the hidden…

Development/Growth

Letter to concerned ministers on fossil fuel subsidies

31st May 2015

To Sri. Piyush Goyal Union Minister for Coal, Power and Renewable Energy Govt. of India, New Delhi Copy with complements: Sri. Prakash Javadekar Union Minister for Environment, Forests and Climate Change Govt. of India, New Delhi Sri. Arun Jaitely Union Minister for Finance Govt. of India, New Delhi Sri Naredra Modi Prime Minister Govt. of…