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Editorial

Advisors Narne Prabhakar Kaza Krishna Rao Dr. N. Harinath Dr. V. Haraprasad Advisory Board M. Gopala Krishna, IAS (Retd.)

C.S. Ramalakshmi, I.F.S, Dr. N. Bhaskara Rao

NUCLEAR WAR ON PLANET AND PEOPLE

Prof. D.N. Reddy

E

Dr. Rameshwar Rao

Nuclear Option and India is also reacting in the same way. But even a regional nuclear war

S. Raghupathy

could spark unprecedented global cooling and reduce rainfall for years and widespread famine

Prof. P.G. Sastry Er. G. Prabhakar

Prof. I.V. Muralikrishna

very year on 26th September, International Day for the Total Elimination of Nuclear Weapons is observed by United Nations. This year it gains special importance for India and Pakistan since Pakistan Prime Minister time and again is giving statements related to

and disease would likely to follow according to the experts. Scientists also predicted large

Editor

decreases in the protective ozone layer leading to much more ultraviolet radiation reaching

Dr. P. Narayana Rao

earth surface and harming the environment and people.The conclusion from the above findings would be that even a regional nuclear conflict would have global consequences. Even our

Associate Editor Dr.B.Ramana Naik

nuclear power plants are vulnerable for natural disasters. Most of our nuclear power plants are in weak seismic zone and are situated in coastal areas and the entire coastal region is

Sub - editor

believed to be vulnerable for tsunami. There is already an example of Fukushima nuclear dis-

Swarajyam P.

aster in Japan. Numerous studies have shown that there is a possible effect of nuclear power

Design arcongraphics@gmail.com

in causing cancer. Studies have shown excessive cancers in both plant workers and surrounding populations. Many stages of the nuclear fuel chain -mining, milling,transport, fuel fabrication, enrichment, reactor construction, decommissioning and waste management -use fossil

Edited, Printed & Published by P. Narayana Rao on behalf of society for environment and education, hyderabad.

fuels emit carbon dioxide and conventional pollutants.Nuclear power plants are vulnerable for attacks which could lead to widespread radioactive contamination. There were examples of such military air strikes on nuclear reactors in Iran and Iraq. In addition to the above dangers, the cost of nuclear power is very high compared to solar power. In this background, we have

Address for communication

to see the permission given by the Department of Atomic Energy for an exploratory drilling for

302, Padma Nilayam,

Uranium ore in Amrabad Tiger Reserve in Telangana. Environmental damage and contamina-

St.No. 1, Shanti Nagar, Hyderabad - 500 028.

tion resulting from leakage of chemicals will affect the health of the people. The drilling of 4000 deep holes will destroy the Tiger Reserve ruining the wildlife and also take away the

email: nraopotturi@yahoo.com

livelihood of the tribals. Alternatively the Renewable Energy such as Solar Projects with decen-

contact: 9247385331

tralized planning will provide employment for the youth of this region. So while pleading for

(The views expressed by authors

nuclear disarmament, we also propose alternative energy sources for people at large instead of

may not be necessarily be the same

nuclear power option. Government of India has to take initiative in stopping the mining oper-

as those of magazine)

ations of uranium ore in the entire country.

September 2019

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Environment & people

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The Importance of Eco Tourism In India

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The Amazon is on fire - here are 5 things you need to know

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September 2019

Fruit's so hot right now, but it can't deliver a balanced diet alone 5 Brazil registers huge spike in Amazon deforestation 6 Increasing wildfires threaten to turn Northern Hemisphere's boreal forests from vital carbon stores into climate heaters 7 UN climate change report: land clearing and farming contribute a third of the world'sgreenhouse gases 10 Insect-eating bird population drops in heavily extracted Himalayan oak forests 14 Animal Welfare: Where Dvoes India Stand?

16 Water is more expensive for the poor than the rich - a new report calculates by how much 18 Drug company reps give quack doctors fridges and televisions to sell antibiotics 20 Engineer Builds Cheap Transparent Concrete That Lowers Electricity Use in Homes by 30%!

21 Microbes are paving the way to sustainable wastewater treatment 22 Holy Basil (Tulsi) Know The Power of This Miracle Herb 24 Nanotechnology: a blessing or a curse for developing nations?

26 Turning agro-waste into environment-friendly plastics 28 India's Coal Power Plants Need Rs 86,135 Crore to Comply With Emission Standards: Study 31 Eco quotes 32 Eco IQ 33 Eco cartoons 34

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Government suggests spring rejuvenation programme for water security 12

S

ummer means fruit. Some varieties as appetising as melon, watermelon, peaches and strawberries are in season. And hot temperatures can put us in the mood for light and fresh meals. Indeed visitors from cooler areas to sunny climes, such as Spain, might be tempted to "fruit binge", cutting back on other foodstuffs.

That can be a dangerous route to go down.

There are also a few tall tales about fruit.

So, when better to tackle them? I work the field of vegetal biotechnology and research the cellular and molecular biology of plants. I have also written the book What is eating healthy? - fruit is a profession as well as passion for me.

Mix it up, and cook Although fruits are very healthy food items, which provide many nutrients and few calories, it is too complicated, if not impossible, to have a balanced diet based solely on fruits. If we tried to do this, we'd miss out on certain nutrients such as vitamin B12.

We hear much about vegetarianism and vegan diets but there are also followers of fruitarianism or frugivorism, who only eat parts of plants that do not involve killing it. They mainly consume fruits and cereals. This makes for a very poor diet that could cause health risks.

In addition, when food is cooked, the availability to consumers of different nutrients increases. Anthropologist Richard Wrangham points out that man is different from other animals in this regard due to

our ability to cook the food, which allows us to get better use and energy from it.

Gorillas are raw vegans, but spend most of their time eating and digesting, and need to eat a much larger amount of food than we do. In short: eating fruit is fine, but it's not a good idea to only eat fruit.

When's fruit o'clock?

One of the myths that we most commonly hear is that, if we eat fruit before meals, it is easier for us to digest and it is less fattening. This is not true at all. Our stomach digests as food reaches it, and it doesn't matter what order we eat things in: everything ends up being broken down so that our intestine can absorb the nutrients.

Myth of the midnight killer melon In Spain there is a popular saying which goes: "Melon in the morning is gold, in the afternoon it's silver, and at night it kills you." Who would have thought that popular wisdom is not always true. In summer, melon is a good option at any time of the day, and it's better to have two slices of this fruit than a Pantagruelian banquet.

This myth seems to date back to the Middle Ages, when melons were so expensive that they were reserved for the elite.

Biting into a melon was the ultimate status symbol. It has been suggested that the emperor of Austria, Albert II, in 1358 and popes Paul II in 1471 and Clement VIII in 1605, died after feasting on melons, which may have given rise to the myth. Proof of just how appreciated they were is that, as

late as the nineteenth century, the writer Alexander Dumas ceded his library to the city of Cavaillon, in Provence, in exchange for the annual delivery of 12 melons until his death.

Beyond just juice It sometimes feels appetising to have a fruit juice rather than fruit, but we must remember that this not equivalent. It's simple: if we eat an orange for dessert or snack, we usually stop at one. But if we make an orange juice, we'll use four or five.

And that means more sugar is consumed.

The other big benefit of fruit, rather than just fruit juice, is fibre. Juice is good for you, but extracting it means losing much of the nutritional value of the rest of the plant. So it's better on two fronts to eat one piece of fruit than to extract the juice of a punnet and slurp it.

There is also no such thing as detoxifying juices, in spite of the fact that some marketing suggests we accumulate toxins, and that we can get rid of them with a diet based heavily on juices. Intoxication requires medical attention, not a smoothie.

So, as a researcher working on the biotechnology of plants, and a fruit lover, I can say with confidence, go forth and enjoy a wide range of fruit this summer. But, as ever, do so as part of a balanced diet. No matter how good it tastes, fruit alone will not delivery a healthy lifestyle.

(Source: theconversation.com)

September 2019

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Environment & people

Clear cutting in the rainforest has gone up 88% in June compared to the same time last year.

The new government's push for more logging may, however, scuttle the new EU-Mercosur free-trade agreement.

T

he Brazilian Space Agency has released data documenting a massive spike in deforestation in the Amazon rainforest. Citing figures from June, the agency registered an 88.4% increase over the same month in 2018.

That figure comes on the heels of increased deforestation in May, which was up 34% compared to 2018.

The agency measures annual July to July activity, but says the first 11 months of this year's report already show a 15% rise over the previous period.

That increase translates to some 4,565 square kilometers (1,762 square miles) of lost rainforest over an 11 month period.

June alone saw the loss of 920 square kilometers.

Things getting far worse under Bolsonaro Environmentalists have long been concerned about the steady loss of one of the world's largest sources of oxygen and carbon sequestration and their fears were compounded when far-right anti-environment candidate Jair Bolsonaro became president in January.

Bolsonaro has aggressively dismantled environmental laws and protections for indigenous people living in the Amazon in order to spur economic growth.

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Read more: Brazil opens huge swathe of Amazon rainforest to mining Much of the area being clear cut is converted for agricultural planting, such as soy beans and grains, as well as for ranching and mining. The need for such clear cutting has been fueled by the world's growing lust for meat as a dietary choice.

Soon to lose a space the size of Iran?

Bolsonaro has repeatedly criticized the country's Ibama environmental agency for what he complains are excessive fines against logging. He argues that fines simply drive up prices, making illegal logging more lucrative.

His son Flavio, who is a senator, has also pushed for legislation that would relieve farmers of the obligation of maintaining 20-80% tree cover on their land.

Bloomberg news agency reports that this could lead to the clearing of up to 1.6 million square kilometers of rain forest- a space roughly the size of Iran.

Threatening the environment and trade Though the deforestation may provide short-term profits for Brazil and international companies it is bad news for the environment and could also threaten the passage of trade deals.

Last week, the European Union announced that after almost 20 years it

had reached agreement with the Mercosur bloc -Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, and Uruguay - on a new free-trade deal.

However, EU countries are adamant that all parties involved must uphold commitments to the Paris Agreement on climate change - these include a pledge to curb deforestation.

French President Emmanuel Macron has already said he will not sign the treaty if Brazil pulls out of the Paris accord, something that President Bolsonaro has threatened to do.

Light at the end of the tunnel?

Observers, such as Paulo Adario, a forest strategist for the environmental group Greenpeace, say that although things will get worse under Bolsonaro, it could lead to policy changes for the better down the road.

Speaking of recent deforestation data, Adario said: "When they have the final numbers, if it is really a lot, it would be a nightmare for Bolsonaro. This is something that is really important from an international and Brazilian point of view because the Amazon is an icon."

(Source: https://www.dw.com)

Increasing wildfires threaten to turn Northern Hemisphere's boreal forests from vital carbon stores into climate heaters

I

n 2014, we travelled to the northern boreal forests of Canada to set experimental fires that would help us understand the effect of wildfires on the global carbon cycle. Sadly, we never got the chance to set those fires, because the firefighters enlisted to help us were busy dealing with an area the size of Belgium that was already burning.

That wildfire season was the most severe on record in the region, which itself forms part of the wider boreal ecosystem that engulfs much of the Northern Hemisphere's subarctic lands with coniferous forests shaped by fire.

Thanks in part to the carbon-hungry soils and peatlands they contain, they

punch well above their weight as carbon sinks, covering 10% of the world's land, but storing one-third of the land's carbon.

According to a new study examining the impacts of Canada's 2014 wildfires, that stored carbon is under threat.

Wildfires are becoming so frequent and intense that they are already turning some boreal forest areas from carbon sinks into net emitters.

Most of the carbon in these ecosystems isn't stored in the trees, but in the soils below. In the cold and often waterlogged boreal landscapes, organisms living in the soil aren't able to "eat" dead organic matter that falls onto the forest floor as quickly as in warmer, dryer climates. This allows the

soils to accumulate carbon over millennia, making boreal ecosystems some of the most important carbon sinks in the world.

Wildfires, mostly started naturally by lightning, interrupt this accumulation process by burning the trees and the top layer of this organic soil - the latter accounting on average for three times as much of the CO2 released during burning as from the trees themselves.

As part of the natural carbon cycle, the lost carbon is stored again by new trees that use CO2 from the air to grow, as well as by the dead plants, leaves and branches that accumulate in the soil. It can take many decades until all the carbon that was emitted during a fire is recaptured by the ecosystem but - as long as the time between two fires is longer than the time required to recapture that lost carbon - boreal forests remain a carbon sink.

By sampling more than 200 locations, the new research found that more than a quarter of this Canadian forest burned in the 2014 fires was not more than 60 years old - much younger than the average historic time period between fires of one to two centuries in this region.

They used a clever carbon dating approach to show that, for around half of (cont.. on page no. 13)

September 2019

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Environment & people

Record fires are raging in Brazil's Amazon rainforest, with more than 2,500 fires currently burning. They are collectively emitting huge amounts of carbon, with smoke plumes visible thousands of kilometres away.

F

ires in Brazil increased by 85% in 2019, with more than half in the Amazon region, according to Brazil's space agency.

This sudden increase is likely down to land degradation: land clearing and farming reduces the availability of water, warms the soil and intensifies drought, combining to make fires more frequent and more fierce.

1. Why the Amazon is burning The growing number of fires are the result of illegal forest clearning to create land for farming. Fires are set deliberately and spread easily in the dry season.

The desire for new land for cattle farming has been the main driver of deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon since the 1970s.

Ironically, farmers may not need to clear new land to graze cattle. Research has found a significant number of currently

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September 2019

degraded and unproductive pastures that could offer new opportunities for livestock.

New technical developments also offer the possibility of transforming extensive cattle ranches into more compact and productive farms - offering the same results while consuming less natural resources.

2. Why the world should care The devastating loss of biodiversity does not just affect Brazil. The loss of Amazonian vegetation directly reduces rain across South America and other regions of the world.

The planet is losing an important carbon sink, and the fires are directly injecting carbon into the atmosphere. If we can't stop deforestation in the Amazon, and the associated fires, it raises real questions about our ability to reach the Paris Agreement to slow climate change.

The Brazilian government has set an ambitious target to stop illegal deforestation and restore 4.8 million hectares of degraded Amazonian land by 2030. If these goals are not carefully addressed now, it may not be possible to meaningfully mitigate climate change.

3. What role politics has played Since 2014, the rate at which Brazil has lost Amazonian forest has expanded by

60%. This is the result of economic crises and the dismantling of Brazilian environmental regulation and ministerial authority since the election of President Jair Bolsonaro in 2018.

Bolsonaro's political program includes controversial programs that critics claim will threaten both human rights and the environment. One of his first acts as president was to pass ministerial reforms that greatly Regulations and programs for conservation and traditional communities' rights have been threatened by economic lobbying.

Over the last months, Brazil's government has announced the reduction and extinction of environmental agencies and commissions, including the body responsible for combating deforestation and fires.

4. How the world should react Although Brazil's national and state governments are obviously on the front line of Amazon protection, international actors have a key role to play.

International debates and funding, alongside local interventions and responses, have reshaped the way land is used in the tropics. This means any government attempts to further dismantle climate and conservation policies in the Amazon may

have significant diplomatic and economic consequences.

For example, trade between the European Union and South American trading blocs that include Brazil is increasingly infused with an environmental agenda. Any commercial barriers to Brazil's commodities will certainly attract attention: agribusiness is responsible for more than 20% of the country's GDP. Brazil's continued inability to stop deforestation has also reduced international funding for conservation. Norway and Germany, by far the largest donors to the Amazon Fund, have suspended their financial support.

These international commitments and organisations are likely to exert considerable influence over Brazil to maintain existing commitments and agreements, including restoration targets.

5. There is a solution Brazil has already developed a pioneering political framework to stop illegal deforestation in the Amazon.

Deforestation peaked in 2004, but dramatically reduced following environmental governance, and supply change interventions aiming to end illegal deforestation.

Environmental laws were passed to develop a national program to protect the Amazon, with clearing rates in the Amazon falling by more than two-thirds between 2004 and 2011.

Moreover, private global agreements like the Amazon Beef and Soy Moratorium, where companies agree not to buy soy or cattle linked to illegal deforestation, have also significantly dropped clearing rates.

We have financial, diplomatic and political tools we know will work to stop the whole-sale clearing of the Amazon, and in turn halt these devastating fires.

Now it is time to use them.

(Source: theconversation.com)

September 2019

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Environment & people

UN climate change report: land clearing and farming contribute a third of the world's greenhouse gases We can't achieve the goals of the Paris Climate Agreement without managing emissions from land use, according to a special report released today by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

E

missions from land use, largely agriculture, forestry and land clearing, make up some 22% of the world's greenhouse gas emissions. Counting the entire food chain (including fertiliser, transport, processing, and sale) takes this contribution up to 29%.

The report, which synthesises information from some 7,000 scientific papers, found there is no way to keep global warming under 2?

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without significant reductions in land sector emissions.

Land puts out emissions - and absorbs them The land plays a vital role in the carbon cycle, both by absorbing greenhouse gases and by releasing them into the atmosphere. This means our land resources are both part of the climate change problem and potentially part of the solution.

Improving how we manage the land could reduce climate change at the same time as it improves agricultural sustainability, supports biodiversity, and increases food security.

While the food system emits nearly a third of the world's greenhouse gases - a situation also reflected in Australia - land-based ecosystems absorb the equivalent of about 22% of global greenhouse gas emis-

sions. This happens through natural processes that store carbon in soil and plants, in both farmed lands and managed forests as well as in natural "carbon sinks" such as forests, seagrass and wetlands.

There are opportunities to reduce the emissions related to land use, especially food production, while at the same time protecting and expanding these greenhouse gas sinks.

But it is also immediately obvious that the land sector cannot achieve these goals by itself. It will require substantial reductions in fossil fuel emissions from our energy, transport, industrial, and infrastructure sectors.

Overburdened land So, what is the current state of our land resources? Not that great.

The report shows there are

unprecedented rates of global land and freshwater used to provide food and other products for the record global population levels and consumption rates.

For example, consumption of food calories per person worldwide has increased by about one-third since 1961, and the average person's consumption of meat and vegetable oils has more than doubled.

The pressure to increase agricultural production has helped push about a quarter of the Earth's ice-free land area into various states of degradation via loss of soil, nutrients and vegetation.

Simultaneously, biodiversity has declined globally, largely because of deforestation, cropland expansion and unsustainable land-use intensification.

Australia has experienced much the same trends.

Climate change exacerbates land degradation Climate change is already having a major impact on the land. Temperatures over land are rising at almost twice the rate of global average temperatures.

Linked to this, the frequency and intensity of extreme events such as heatwaves and flooding rainfall has increased. The global area of drylands in drought has increased by over 40% since 1961.

These and other changes have reduced agricultural productivity in many regions - including Australia. Further climate changes will likely spur soil degradation, loss of vegetation, biodiversity and permafrost, and increases in fire damage and coastal degradation.

Water will become more scarce, and our food supply will become less stable. Exactly how these risks will evolve will depend on population growth, consumption patterns and also how the global community responds.

Overall, proactive and informed management of our land (for food, water and biodiversity) will become increasingly important.

Stopping land degradation helps everyone Tackling the interlinked problems of land degradation, climate change adaptation and mitigation, and food security can deliver win-wins for farmers, communities, governments, and ecosystems.

The report provides many examples of on-ground and policy options that could improve the management of agriculture and forests, to enhance production, reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and make these areas more robust to climate change. Leading Australian farmers are already heading down these paths, and we have a lot to teach the world about how to do this.

We may also need to reassess what we demand from the land. Farmed animals are a major contributor to these emissions, so plant-based diets are increasingly being adopted.

Similarly, the report found about 25-30% of food globally is lost or wasted.

Reducing this can significantly lower emissions, and ease pressure on agricultural systems.

How do we make this happen?

Many people around the world are doing impressive work in addressing some of these problems. But the solutions they generate are not necessarily widely used or applied comprehensively.

To be successful, coordinated policy packages and land management approaches are pivotal. Inevitably, all solutions are highly location-specific and contextual, and it is vital to bring together local communities and industry, as well as governments at all levels.

(Source: theconversation.com)

September 2019

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Government suggests spring rejuvenation programme for water security

by Mayank Aggarwal About 15 percent of India's population depends on spring water from mountains. But over one-third of these springs are drying up, endangering water security of the people dependent on the springs.

The newly formed Jal Shakti ministry has now come out with a framework document which highlights the urgent need to revive springs and calls for focused spring rejuvenation programmes.

The document suggests steps like mapping of springs, identification of recharge areas and sites for construction of appropriate recharge structures.

It is estimated that about nearly 200 million Indians, about 15 percent of the country's population, depend upon spring water from the Himalayas, Western Ghats, Eastern Ghats, Aravallis and other such mountain ranges for domestic and livelihood needs. These spring water sources, however, are facing the threat of drying up. To address that, the Union Ministry of Jal Shakti Ministry has recently released a framework document that sets out a policy pathway to rejuvenate springs.

The framework document notes that there is an urgent need to revive/regenerate springs the source for drinking water, sanitation and irrigation among the Himalayan population - and to ensure sustainable and equitable uses of the augmented groundwater resources in these mounEnvironment & people

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tainous regions.

"Spring discharge is reported to be declining due to degradation and erratic trends in precipitation," the document observed stressing an urgent need to restore, revive and sustain springs. "Lack of knowledge, understanding and awareness on springs has further compounded the problem while also inducing elements of conflicts and haphazard development. Land-use changes, rapid urban expansion and growing commercial consumption are affecting forests and impacting spring water availability," it noted..

A "pilot project has been proposed for spring inventory and rejuvenation in Tehri Garhwal district of Uttarakhand," as per the framework document, with the Union Ministry of Jal Shakti as the nodal agency for spring rejuvenation.

The document also called for mapping of the springshed, identification of recharge areas, pinpointing sites for appropriate recharge structures, construction of recharge structures through the convergence of activities under rural employment guarantee schemes.

Himachal Pradesh-based researcher-activist, Manshi Asher recommends a holistic approach for rejuvenation of springs.

"Some aspects of spring rejuvenation is addressing erosion and deforestation. The problem is the lack of a holistic approach. When the government talks about spring rejuvenation we can't only look at small interventions for a particular spring but we need to look at overall catchment areas and developmental

activities like hydropower projects. Only talking about water without looking at other interlinkages is going to be pointless," Asher of Himdhara Collective, an environmental research and action group, told MongabayIndia.

"Communities and inhabitants of catchments need to have a stake, ownership in any such process of planning and management," she said.

Several states and non-governmental organisations are already pursuing some kind of spring revival programmes. For instance, in an initiative by the Sikkim government, drought-prone rain-shadow areas of the South District and the West District of the state was targeted for preserving springs. The effort resulted in recharging of 1,035 million litres of groundwater annually covering 637 hectares and revival of 60 springs and four lakes in 20 drought-prone gram panchayats. Meghalaya has also start-

requirements, the document explained, adding that with "changing climatic conditions and rainfall pattern, a large number of villages, hamlets and settlements" are staring at a potential of severe drinking water shortage.

Over the past couple of years, water security has steadily garnered a lot of attention. This move by the government is in line with promises made by Prime Minister Narendra Modi during the campaign for India's 2019 parliamentary elections where he had assured that his government would focus on access to safe drinking water.

After his party won the elections and came back into power in May 2019, all departments related to water issues were merged to form the 'Jal Shakti' ministry for a focused approach on water issues ranging from providing clean drinking water, international and inter-state water disputes, to the clean Ganga project.

ed work to map 60,000 springs and create a plan for spring water management for about 5,000 springs in 11 districts over the next four years. Other states where such programmes are ongoing include Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh, Nagaland, Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya, Jammu and Kashmir and some hilly areas parts of West Bengal.

Dry springs lead to drinking water shortage Water from the Himalayan rivers is not readily available to the densely populated villages and towns in the mid-hills of the Himalayas as the fast-flowing rivers cut deep gorges and flow several hundred metres below while the glaciers are far above. The communities then depend on rain-fed springs and streams for their water

During his June 2019 radio address, 'Mann ki Baat', Modi had urged people to start a mass movement for water conservation.

In 2018, Indian government's think tank Niti Aayog came out with a report, 'Inventory and revival of springs in the Himalayas for water security' which held that about 30 percent of springs crucial to water security of people in the Indian Himalayan Region (IHR) are drying and 50 percent have reported reduced discharge.

The Niti Aayog report had highlighted that 60 percent of the population in the IHR depend upon spring water and recommended a systematic mapping and revival of springs across the Himalayas.

(Source: india.mongabay.com)

(page no. 7 cont...) the area of this young forest burnt in 2014, the soil had lost more carbon in the 2014 fire than had accumulated since the previous fire in the 1960s. In other words, the interval between fires was so short that the fire also burned into organic layers that contained "legacy carbon" that was accumulated before the 1960s. Thus, half of the young forest soil had transformed from a carbon sink to a carbon source in this fire-recovery cycle.

Climate change is shortening the interval between fires in boreal regions, leaving less time for forests to regrow. It's also increasing the intensity of individual fires, allowing them to burn deeper into the soil. These factors mean that more and more of an ecosystem on which we rely so much to remove carbon from the atmosphere could soon fall on the opposite side of the carbon ledger.

That's true not just for North American boreal forests, but also the vast forests in Russia, China, and other sub-arctic regions covered by the sprawling ecosystem.

We're currently studying boreal forests in little-researched north-eastern China, where worried forest managers are reporting decreased snow cover and burning of an intensity and extent they have not experienced before.

So what can we do to protect the boreal carbon sink? Given the vast size and remoteness of most boreal fires, comprehensive firefighting measures would require astronomical resources - as has been highlighted by Russian authorities in response to the extensive fires in Siberia this summer.

A better option would be to protect healthy peatlands and restore drained ones, as they can be very effective natural fire breaks - and if they do catch fire they recover carbon relatively fast.

But the reality is that we are powerless to substantially alter the effect of wildfires on the boreal forest system - other than by swiftly cutting our carbon emissions. It's time for renewable energy to spread like wildfire.

(Source: theconversation.com)

September 2019

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Environment & people

Neha Jain Rural biomass extraction in the Himalayan forests dominated by oak in the state of Uttarakhand simplifies the forest structure by opening up the canopy and making the understorey less dense.

This, in turn, negatively affects the species richness and abundance of insect-eating birds and oak specialist species.

Local village-based extraction of NTFP is often considered to be sustainable as it is believed that subsistence users ensure resource sustainability via strong village institutions.

However, this study indicates that extractive activities can significantly modify vegetation structure which, in turn, results in local extinctions of certain species within vulnerable avifaunal guilds, state the authors.

To reduce extractive activities, researchers suggest expanding protected areas, providing alternatives to forest timber and eco-tourism.

Long-term rural extraction of biomass in oak-dominated Himalayan forests disturbs the forest structure. This, in turn, affects diversity and composition of insect-eating birds and oak forest specialists, which were the most vulnerable to local extinctions, reports a recent study.

Apart from conserving oak forest stands, "the study shows that it is necessary to maintain the historic mosaic of protected Environment & people

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forest, managed forests and agriculture, if the entire complement of forest bird fauna at this altitude [1700-2200m] is to be protected," said Ghazala Shahabuddin, senior author of the study and a scientist at the Dehradun-based not-for-profit organization Centre for Ecology, Development and Research.

"Agriculture has earlier been shown to be an important refuge for high altitude avifauna during their downhill winter migration," she added.

Few studies have investigated the effect of low-intensity biomass extraction of fodder, fuelwood, and medicinal products, said Tarun Menon, lead author of the study. Such removal can disturb the forest structure and impact biodiversity in the long-term, he added.

This is the first study that has quantitatively investigated the effect of non-timber forest extraction on the diversity and abundance of birds in mid-elevation Western Himalayan forests. Such forests are dominated by oak, and are interspersed with agricultural land, pine forests and orchards, making the landscape matrix diverse.

Oak forests in the middle Himalayas consist of stateowned reserved forests, private forests or community/village forests. The governance system of community-managed forests (known as van panchayat forests) in the region is unique

to the state of Uttarakhand. They are comanaged by both the government and local village committees, under agreements for sustainable use.

"The reason we chose the mid-elevation of the Himalayas to conduct this study is that this region has significant human population densities that are highly dependent on oak forests for their livelihoods," said Menon, who conducted this study during his Masters at Bengaluru's National Centre for Biological Sciences (NCBS). "These same oak forests help maintain the hydrological balance while also being home to a high diversity of endemic and range-restricted bird species."

"Although this extraction is mostly for local consumption [such as livestock grazing, fuelwood extraction, lopping off branches for fodder, collection of leaf litter for compost], increasing population (both local and tourist) puts increased demand on these forest resources," added Menon.

While such extraction has been going on for many years in community-managed forests, the effects on forests are cumulative and the "chronic effects of this extraction are seen only much later," he explained.

Simplified forest structure affects insectivores and oak specialists Menon, Shahabuddin along with coauthor Hari Sridhar sampled birds during two seasons (winter and spring-summer) at 74 sites with varying levels of extraction in the middle elevation (1700-2200 m) moist temperate forests of Uttarakhand.

The forests straddle the Nainital and Almora districts of Kumaon and are dominated by 'banj oak' (Quercus leucotrichophora). They analysed multiple parameters as a function of vegetation structure: the number of bird species found (or species richness), the abundance of different species, community composition, and guild abundances based on habitat preferences and diet.

Their results showed that in the intensively-used oak forests, extractive activities such as lopping, leaf litter collection, and grazing had resulted in reduced complexity of the vegetation. Trees were shorter and smaller in girth, the canopy was more open and the understorey was less dense.

The bird community in the area consisted mostly of insect-eating (insectivorous) species, such as flycatchers, thrushes, woodpeckers and cuckoos. The species

richness and abundance decreased due to the changes in vegetation structure, particularly canopy cover and density of the understorey vegetation. The species composition was affected more by both local and landscape-level factors. Insectivorous birds and oak forest specialists such as the maroon oriole, grey-winged blackbird, pied thrush and rufous-bellied niltava disappeared due to the drop in canopy cover and proportion of oak forests in the landscape.

Such adverse effects of long-term biomass extraction on insectivores and oak specialists may be intensified by the loss of contiguous oak forests in the landscape, said Shahabuddin.

By consuming insects, these birds help in controlling the population of pests. Without their services, outbreaks of pests could damage trees, causing economic losses.

"Extraction of non-timber forest produce opens up the forest canopy to sunlight, causing desiccation of the soil, and also affects the shrub and sapling layer, which is important for oak forest birds. Only short trees with poor foliage and small girth remain after several years of continuous extraction," said Shahabuddin.

Ramesh Krishnamurthy, a scientist at the Wildlife Institute of India, who was not connected with the study, said that he was not surprised by the results, because oak forests - and most broadleaved forests in the Himalayan region - are under exploitation and these forests also have a rich biodiversity.

"What will be important to know is, to what extent the exploitation of resources may be tolerant to birds; and what will be the offset for biodiversity and people if we are to take strong preventive mechanisms or allow people to continue the exploitation."

Expanding protected areas, controlled extraction and alternative livelihoods These findings have policy implications for the way forests are managed in the middle Himalayan region. To mitigate adverse effects on birds, the authors call for maintaining sufficient old-growth banj oak stands in the neighbourhood of van pan-

chayat (used) forests. Old-growth forests act as a "repository of biodiversity that are currently threatened by the expansion of roads, tourism, horticulture and urban settlements in the middle Himalayas."

Specifically, the authors recommended that the Uttarakhand forest department expand the current protected area system in the 1500 to 2400m elevation zone through community reserves and wildlife sanctuaries.

Shahabuddin added that the Uttarakhand Forest Department could consider establishing appropriate monetary

incentives to van panchayats through the Compensatory Afforestation Fund Management and Planning Authority (CAMPA), to implement sustainable practices aimed at enhancing the biodiversity conservation value of used forests.

Among such measures, extraction could be controlled or regulated in ways to preserve canopy cover, vertical stratification, and understory density, the researchers suggested.

"For instance, forest stands can be harvested in rotational sequence so that harvested portions can regenerate over time," stated Menon.

Although some community-managed forests already have such regulations, Menon points out, many of them are facing (cont.. on page no. 32)

September 2019

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Environment & people

By Alokparna Sengupta

We have the potential to lead the world in animal welfare, but the tendency to look at the issue in a vacuum has prevented this movement from being taken seriously. ince early civilisation, animals have been an integral part of human experience.

We have domesticated them for both agriculture and companionship. However, over time our kinship with them has morphed into abuse in which the welfare of animals is highly compromised. Now we see animals purely for their utility; in fact, a perception has been created that humans always have precedence over animals. It has now become common practice to inflict cruelty upon them.

Animal welfare has always been seen as a niche subject,

One such example is the elephant India has prohibited ivory trade since 1972, when the Wildlife Protection Act came in; however there are still concerns about the illegal trade and the animals’ treatment in captivity.

Their exploitation is masked by activities they are forced into, such as leisurely rides; being chained in temples to give blessings; and being hired out for festivals, weddings, and celebrations, where they are often tormented amongst noisy, frenzied crowds.

This form of tourism is fuelling a rise in elephants captured from the wild and kept

often relegated to being an emotional one. It has also been perceived as a street dog issue or service for pet or privately‘owned’ animals, mainly dogs and cats. Of course, protection of cows has often grabbed headlines as well, but never for their welfare, and the issue is often politically motivated.

In comparison to other animal welfare issues (those that extend beyond what we have highlighted above), people’s awareness tends to be limited to issues pertaining to wildlife

for entertainment. Such elephants are either bred in captivity or stolen from their mothers and made to undergo a process aptly named ‘breaking the spirit’, which subjects them to pain, starvation, confinement, and isolation.

Once the spirit is broken, the animal is subjected to poor working conditions. And in the absence of its natural environment, it begins to behave differently, swaying its head from side to side—a sight we have all seen too often. These conditions

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exploitation; in particular, tiger conservation and humanwildlife conflict (for example, with leopards and snakes). But animals are abused across the country and world, whether in laboratories, farms, or pet shops; and the abuse is often justified for human good.

often result in stress, leading to instances of violence and human-animal conflicts.

Elephants we see on television losing control are representative of the direct result of years of confinement and abuse.

In India, elephants are epitomised as symbols of a very popular Hindu god, and yet their treatment has been just the opposite.

What then, can we say about the fate of lesser known species?

Pangolins, for instance—scaly anteaters who are targeted mainly for their meat and scales—are the most trafficked mammal in the world. It is believed that since 2000, more than one million pangolins have been traded internationally.

These shy creatures are valuable to both people and the ecosystem. They protect crops because they are natural pest controllers, and reduce the need for toxic insecticides. Their sharp claws, long snouts, and tongues help aerate the soil, and more so, each pangolin can eat millions of insects each year.

Their meat and scales are usually exported to China for making traditional Chinese medicines, cosmetics, and jewellery.

These are just two examples; there are plenty more. In fact, so severe is the illegal wildlife trade–generating revenues between USD 7 and 23 billion annually–that it is “the fourth most lucrative global crime after drugs, humans, and arms”.

And this is just the tip of the iceberg The suffering that sinks the titanic, is of those animals that are raised for food. This is an issue that is so neglected that even most of the animal protection community turns a blind eye.

Animal agriculture, which was once predominately carried out by smallholder farmers and considered a symbiotic relationship, has now been highly industrialised where the single point of focus is to increase productivity per animal. In our desire to do this, we have trait selected chickens to grow so freakishly fast that their own skeletons cannot hold their body weight. These abnormally large animals are then used for meat.

More than 80 percent of India’s eggs come from egg-laying hens confined in

small cages, termed ‘battery cages’, where they cannot stand up straight, turn around, or spread their wings. The space given to each is reportedly less than an A4 size sheet of paper.

Factory farms don’t inflict harm just on animals; there are environmental impacts as well. The volume of waste that is allowed to accumulate in factory farms presents an enviornmental hazard. Water quality issues also arise from factory farmgenerated waste, which include contamination of surface water and ground water.

In addition, the microbial breakdown of organic carbon and nitrogen compounds in the animal manure can contribute to air pollution and odour problems. Emission of noxious levels of gases puts workers and nearby residents at risk of developing several acute and chronic illnesses.

What has India done to address some of this?

All is not grim.

India has historically enacted good laws; for instance, the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act enacted in 1960 by the Parliament of India, prevents the infliction of unnecessary pain or suffering on animals.

This act has been utilised to appeal to the government against nefarious acts committed towards animals. India also enjoys one of the strictest wildlife protection laws.

While some countries are now waking up to regulating trade in wildlife—a case in point being ivory trade—India leads the prohibition on ivory trade, including that of the extinct mammoth to prevent any proliferation of the trade.

Some of the biggest triumphs for animal welfare in India in the last decade, saw the ban of dolphinariums (aquariums for dolphins) in 2013, by the Ministry of Environment and Forests. In addition, the Government of India banned animal testing for cosmetics in 2014, followed by a prohibition on the import of cosmetics tested on animals, placing India on the map

for scientifically progressive countries.

India has also prohibited the export of shark fins for use in shark fin soup. (Did you know that India was the third largest shark landing nation in the world?) We are also one of the few nations which does not allow wild animals in circuses. The government is now planning to remove all animals from circuses.

While these are positive developments, regulators and the government constitute just one slice of the pie. What we need today is widespread acceptance of animal protection as a serious social issue. Animal and non-animal social sectors must recognise their intersectionality and work

together. Corporates need to look at what role their institutions are playing in animal cruelty, be it procuring battery caged eggs or team outings at captive animal spaces.

Mahatma Gandhi once said, “The greatness of a nation and its progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated”. India has the potential to lead the world in animal welfare, however the tendency to look at animal welfare issues in a vacuum rather than as an interlinked issue with other civil society concerns, has prevented this movement from being taken seriously.

(Source: www.ipsnews.net)

September 2019

17

Environment & people

The report looks at water affordability in 15 cities, two of them in India.

H

ow much does a tanker of water cost in Mumbai? About 52 times the price of piped water, a new study has found. The study, published in the form of a working paper by the World Resources Institute, maps water access and affordability in 15 cities around the world, including Mumbai and Bengaluru.

In both cities, it found that piped water supply is erratic: just three hours for three days of the week in Bengaluru and seven hours a day in Mumbai. The worst off are people living in informal settlements who do not have access to piped water and are forced to buy tanker water at exorbitant prices.

Since piped water is subsidised in India, this means "poor households which are not connected to the piped water network are not getting the subsidy,'' said Dr Victoria Beard, professor of city and regional planning at Cornell University, fellow at the World Resources Institute, and one of the authors of the paper. "So you are subsidising middle or upper-class households that can afford that water anyway."

Underestimating the water crisis In 2015, the World Resources Institute, a global research organisation that works on the challenges around the sustainable use of natural resources, launched a project entitled "Towards a More Equal City". In it, researchers examine the hypothesis that equitable access to natural resources and core services leads to a more sustainable and productive city.

It is within this context that the World Resources Institute published the working paper titled "Unaffordable and Undrinkable: Rethinking Urban Water Access in the Global South". In addition to Beard, the paper is authored by Diana Mitlin, professor at the University of Manchester and principal researcher at the International Institute for Environment and Development, David Satterthwaite, senior fellow at the International Institute for Environment and Development and a visiting professor at University College London, and Jillian Du, research analyst at the World Resources Institute.

The paper starts with the conviction that "equitable access to safe, reliable, and affordable water is a human right".

The researchers contend that data measuring the progress made by countries towards Sustainable Development Goals set by the United Nations in 2015 underestimates the global water crisis. This is because what is measured is water Environment & people

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access, not so much its quality, regularity or affordability. In South Asia, as more people continue to move to cities, many more are living without regular piped water in their homes.

informal settlements are not connected to the piped water network. This is because urban administrations worry that by providing water and sanitation facilities to such settlements, they end up "formalising" them.

Secondly, the price of water is not set efficiently. As Beard pointed out, it is piped water that is subsidised, which means that those who don't have piped water - the poorest households - don't benefit from the subsidy.

The World Bank recommends that a household spend no more than 3%-5% of

comes. It also means that when water pressure is low in the pipes, they can get contaminated from sewage, groundwater and other sources, through cracks. When the system is repressurised, this contaminated water is delivered to people's taps.

its income on water. But if households are paying for tanker water, they end up paying a lot more. In Mumbai, tanker water is 52 times the price of piped water, while in Bengaluru it is 12 times the price of piped water.

each city. For instance, in Bengaluru, there is a "water mafia" that captures the water from the community standpipe and charges a higher price for it. In Colombo, there is a floating population that comes into the city in the day and leaves at night, which affects water consumption patterns there significantly.

Then there are unique challenges to

The paper examines 15 cities in the Global South, which is a term used by the World Bank to denote lower and middle income countries. The World Resources Institute looks at three regions in the Global South: South Asia, Latin America and Sub-Saharan Africa.

The cities selected in South Asia were Mumbai, Bengaluru, Karachi, Dhaka and Colombo. They were selected for several reasons: these are rapidly urbanising cities, they have a range of population sizes, they are somewhat representative of the region, and they fulfil practical considerations like the availability of researchers to conduct fieldwork.

The report is built upon three years of research. While datasets at the city level from publicly available data, administrative records, websites and project records were collected, the researchers also conducted fieldwork at one informal settlement per city to study how conditions in these places differed from average conditions across the city. In Mumbai, the settlement selected was Siddharth Nagar, while in Bengaluru, it was the Koramangala Slum Cluster.

What the researchers found There are three issues relating to water access that the paper delves into. Firstly,

Thirdly, the areas that do get piped water don't get a 24-hour supply through the week. This intermittence in water supply means that people spend much of their time waiting to collect water, whenever it

What the report recommends The authors recommend urban administrations focus on four action areas to ensure equitable water access for all.

The first is an efficient way to move water, for which the authors strongly advocate extending the piped network. They found it was the least expensive way of providing water, after studying a variety of (cont.. on page no. 30)

September 2019

19

Environment & people

Drug company reps give quack doctors fridges and televisions to sell antibiotics

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wo of India's biggest drug companies are alleged to be giving inducements to "quack" doctors of gifts and cash to encourage them to prescribe vast amounts of antibiotics, fuelling the rise of drug-resistant superbugs around the world.

Undercover reporting by the Bureau has revealed that Abbott and Sun Pharma - whose products and devices are sold and used in more than a hundred countries, including in the US and by the NHS in the UK promote antibiotics to healthcare practitioners who often have no formal medical training. It is illegal to sell antibiotics to quack doctors in most parts of India, but the law is rarely enforced. There are no restrictions on promoting the drugs to them.

These so-called quacks, who can be the only healthcare provider in their impoverished communities, often go on to prescribe antibiotics incorrectly. By offering incomplete or simply unnecessary treatments, they unwittingly speed up the creation of superbugs that kill tens of thousands of babies in India alone each year. An Abbott salesman suggested he knew the drugs might be misused, but he was motivated purely by profit.

A Sun Pharma salesman told an undercover Bureau reporter that quacks and real doctors were given high value gifts to encourage them not to switch to a competitor. These ranged from gift cards, medical equipment and fridges to televisions, travel and cash. Sales representatives would also offer extra pills or money as an incentive to buy more antibiotics, encouraging potentially dangerous overprescription.

Sun Pharma is the largest drug manufacturer in India, with more

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than ÂŁ3bn revenue in 2018, and its products are used by the NHS. NHS rules do not prevent it buying from companies that give inducements to doctors, as long as none are given in the British supply chain. The NHS also buys devices from Abbott Laboratories, a US company that pulled in more than ÂŁ24bn in revenue last year. Its Indian subsidiary, Abbott India, is the second-biggest pharmaceutical business in the country.

At Abbott, a salesman said that doctors and quacks were lured in with gifts worth up to 2,000 rupees (ÂŁ23). The company also offered

buy-five-get-one-free deals on boxes of antibiotics, encouraging bulk buying and consequently more prescriptions - "whether necessary or unnecessary," he said.

India's unqualified doctors - who are often from poor rural areas and slums - earn so little that these incentives can raise their monthly income by as much as a quarter. Abbott also offers doctors a taste of luxury, throwing surprise parties for their families and cocktail soirees in five-star hotels.

Spokespeople for both companies said that their policies prohibited offering gifts to healthcare providers to encourage prescriptions.

Rising use of antibiotics is the main cause of antimicrobial resistance (AMR), one of the world's greatest health threats. Bacteria evolve resistance to drugs naturally over time, becoming superbugs, but mass or inappropriate use dramatically speeds up this process.

Experts condemned the pharmaceutical companies for encouraging incorrect use of antibiotics and selling to quacks, who contribute to AMR when they wrongly prescribe the drugs.

Lord Jim O'Neill, who led a global review of AMR, called the Bureau's findings astonishing.

He said: "Many pharmaceutical companies like to position themselves as being responsible and here is some rather frank evidence to the contrary."

Professor Ramanan Laxminarayan, director of the Centre for Disease Dynamics, Economics and Policy (CDDEP), said: "When you consider that there are five times the number of rural medical practitioners in India as there are trained medical doctors, it should come as no surprise that the majority of antibiotics reach patients through this channel. It is no surprise that pharma companies push antibiotics through [them].

"There is a need to balance access to antibiotics, which these practitioners provide, and also prevent overuse and inappropriate use and therein lies the challenge."

(Source: thebureauinvestigates.com)

Engineer Builds Cheap Transparent Concrete That Lowers Electricity Use in Homes by 30%!

Made from industrial waste and free from carbon dioxide, these energy-saving bricks are 23% stronger, 5% lighter and allow sunlight to pass while blocking heat and water.

by Gopi Karelia f the cement industry were a country, it would be the third-largest carbon dioxide emitter in the world with up to 2.8bn tonnes, surpassed only by China and the US," reports The Guardian.

The article goes on to mention that over the past 60 years, we have produced 8bn tonnes of plastic, but what's worse? The cement industry churns out twice that amount every two years! While cement continues to remain the go-to material due to its affordability and durability, it's carbon footprint is devastating to the environment.

Cement produces eight per cent of the world's carbon dioxide according to the London-based not-for-profit and non-governmental organisation Chatham House that analyses and promotes the understanding of major international issues. A 27-year-old Civil Engineer from Kanpur, Uttar Pradesh had the same worries at the back of his head. This led him to develop a transparent concrete that partially utilises industrial waste in the place of cement.

This switch helps in reducing CO2 emissions by reducing the cement consumption and can reduce electricity bills by 30 per cent.

Ramansh Bajpai, currently pursuing his Masters in Environmental Science from Harcourt Butler Technical University (HBTU), Kanpur, has developed this ecofriendly alternative as part of his final year project.

After ten months of hard work and several failed attempts, Ramansh finally perfected the formula. The rectangularshaped concrete is made from plastic optical fibres, steel and industry waste (ground granulated blast furnace slag).

"I

The use of industrial waste further ensures that the cost of the transparent concrete is 15 per cent less than regular cement. In terms of durability, it is 23 per cent stronger and 5 per cent lighter.

The concrete can be used in green buildings and in high-rise buildings as curtain walls that do not bear any load of the building. The main advantage is that it allows the natural light to enter the room, but no heat or water can pass

through the wall, thus preventing leakages or dampness. Since the room with transparent concrete will get the maximum amount of natural light, the use of electricity will come down, Ramansh tells The Better India (TBI). Many decorative transparent materials are available in the market, but they are mostly made by fibres which are not fire-resistant. This transparent concrete can withstand much higher temperatures. In case of a fire, only the plastic optical fibres may be damaged but not the wall or building, Ramansh adds.

The final year student tested the material in the university and was certified successful by Deepesh Kumar Singh, Assistant Professor at the university. It was under his guidance that Ramansh made this sustain-

able invention.

Ramansh's invention fulfils the criteria of being a cheaper and greener alternative to cement. Using transparent concrete is a viable solution to the problem of cement emitting carbon dioxide and contributing to greenhouse gases. The construction material can also be used in low-cost housing schemes, Singh tells TBI. Ramansh used his personal savings for

the project. However, his project is currently on hold due to financial constraints, "I want to develop the material for commercial use and for that I need investors," adds the engineer.

We hope that Ramansh's futuristic invention paves the way for a green future in the construction sector.

(Source: thebetterindia.com)

September 2019

21

Environment & people

Microbes are paving the way to sustainable wastewater treatment

By GGGI One morning Namitha awoke to a frantic call, “He can’t breathe. When he inhales, his ribs ache�, said Panchi. Panchi was one of the young mothers of the community that she was volunteering with and is just one among the thousands who use polluted water from the Yamuna River for her daily needs. Her son never fully recovered just like many other villagers who have been struck with epidemics of bone deformities, fluoride poisoning and water-borne diseases due to the rising water pollution in India.

According to the United Nations World Water Development Report, up to 80 percent of the global wastewater flows back into the ecosystem without being treated or reused, contributing to a situation where around 1.8 billion people use a source of drinking water contaminated with faeces, putting them at risk of contracting cholera, dysentery, typhoid and polio, which in turn has severe impacts on their physical and learning abilities throughout their lives.

An estimated 14% of the global population still lacks access to electricity.

Energy from fossil fuels is the dominant contributor to global climate change accounting for around 60% of global greenhouse gas emissions.

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Only 51 % of all treated water in Abu Dhabi is recycled while the rest is discharged into the environment of which 400,000 m3 is disposed into the South Mussafah Channel.

Wastewater is not treated before disposal since it entails high costs and energy.

BactoWatt was born out of necessity to alleviate the problems of world energy crisis, climate change, clean water and sanitation. Contrary to conventional treatment processes using various chemicals, Bactowatt treats wastewater sustainably using microbes and reduces carbon dioxide emissions, quantity of sludge, cost and treatment time. It also produces viable byproducts like renewable energy and reusable grey water.

The technology is based on microbial fuel cells which is a device that converts biochemical energy to electrical energy by the action of microorganisms. The applications of BactoWatt range from wastewater treatment plants & manufacturing industries to low income communities, municipalities and non-profit organizations.

The core idea is to transform wastewater into a renewable resource that

proves to be the need of the hour with the current rate of fossil fuel overuse.

As a start up, here for the long haul, we plan to advance in three phases; Phase 1 involves innovation partnerships to create the pilot prototype, Phase 2 involves the testing and development of the pilot prototype and Phase 3 involves production and launch of our commercial prototype.

Our team is a group of five young professionals who have varied backgrounds ranging from design and engineering to biotechnology. We share an immense passion for sustainability and BactoWatt is just our first step to giving back to the community and Planet Earth.

Being a part of the Greenpreneurs program has been one of the most enriching experiences into entrepreneurship for BactoWatt. Greenpreneurs and its wonderful team have put together an amazing program which will help pave the way for incredible sustainable ideas to take shape for generations to come.

To receive advice from subject matter experts, gain insight from our wonderful mentors and trainers, and get a chance to interact with our GGGI country representatives were once-in-a lifetime opportunities. We would like to thank Greenpreneurs for believing in us and giving us this incredible opportunity to participate in a global competition.

(Source: ipsnews.net)

The Importance of Eco Tourism In India Arnav

Travel and tourism in India has always been a thriving industry.

And it is on an exponential rise , primarily because of the vast knowledge sharing on social media platforms. In 2013 alone, tourism contributed USD 113.3 billion to the Indian GDP. Factors like better transport connectivity, a rise in luxury budget hotels have also supported the growth.

I

n recent years, startups offering various perks and discounts to the customers in the form of promotional e-cash, flight miles, voucher coupons an so on, have come up, and that adds to the revenue flow.

All of this provides a win-win situation for both the vendors and the customers, and the customers get bitten by the travel bug.

Once the customer comes out of his shell and starts travelling, he starts exploring the unexplored beauty of different places, becomes an extrovert and starts socializing with the localities and fellow travelers. This unleashes a wide range of possibilities to travel and explore without creating a hole in the pocket.

However, this rise of the travel industry has also resulted in the deterioration of certain places which were quaint and beautiful at one point of time but now are flooded with tourists and the natural beauty has been compromised.

Locations in Himachal Pradesh like McLoedganj, Triund, Kasol, Kheerganga

and Manali have become flooded with tourists as these places are located just a couple of hours away from Punjab, Haryana and Delhi. The tourists who come in flocks usually leave the place dirty and messy with their litter and ruin the natural beauty of the destination.

But what is Eco Tourism?

Fundamentally, eco-tourism means making as little environmental impact as possible and helping to sustain the indigenous populace, thereby encouraging the preservation of wildlife and habitats when visiting a place. This is a responsible form of tourism and tourism development, which encourages going back to natural products in every aspect of life. It is also the key to sustainable ecological development.

It’s high time one needs to be conscious towards the environment and make sure that his recreational activities don’t adversely affect the natural beauty of the place. A responsible Wraveler (Wanderer + Traveler…get it? Ha ha.) thus needs to keep the following Dos and Don’ts in mind while exploring a destination.

Dos Carry back all non-degradable litter such as empty bottles, tins, plastic bags etc.

These must not litter the environment or be buried. They must be disposed in municipal dustbins only.

Observe the sanctity of holy sites, temples and local cultures.

Cut noise pollution. Do not blare aloud radios, tape recorders or other electronic entertainment equipment in nature resorts, sanctuaries and wildlife parks.

In case temporary toilets are set-up near campsites, after defecation, cover with mud or sand. Make sure that the spot is at least 30 meters away from the water source.

Don’ts Do not take away flora and fauna in the forms of cuttings, seeds or roots. It is illegal, especially in the Himalayas. The environment is really delicate in this region and the biodiversity of the region has to be protected at all costs.

Do not use pollutants such as detergent, in streams or springs while washing and bathing.

Do not use wood as fuel to cook food at the campsite.

Do not leave cigarettes butts or make open fires in the forests.

Do not consume aerated drinks, alcohol, drugs or any other intoxicant and throw bottles in the wild.

Polythene and plastics are nonbiodegradable and unhealthy for the environment and must not be used and littered.

If one happens to visit popular hill stations like Kasol (Parvati Valley), McLoedganj or popular trekking routes such as Triund, Kheerganga one is sure to find toffee wrappers, chips packets, plastic water bottles littered all around. This litter (cont.. on page no. 32)

September 2019

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Environment & people

Sudha Jeevan

Tulsi or Holy Basil is an aromatic plant that belongs to the basil family Lamiaceae with the botanic names Ocimum tenuiflorum and ocimum sanctum. It is widely known as “Queen of Herbs” and the ‘Mother Medicine of Nature”.

I

t is one of the popular varieties of basil that are mostly grown in the South Asian Regions. Rama Tulsi, Krishna Thulsi and Vana Thulsi are the Holy Basil varieties grown in India. Due to its medicEnvironment & people

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September 2019

inal properties, these are known as medicinal holy basil and is revered as the “Elixir of life” in the oldest medicinal practice Ayurveda.

According to the Journal of Ayurveda and Integrative Medicine, Thulsi is an adaptogenic herb which has a wide array of medicinal properties that can enhance our health and well-being.

Medicinal Properties of Tulsi (Holy Basil) In Ayurveda, Tulsi (Holy Basil) is recommended and used to treat several diseases. The range of diseases, that are effectively treated with Tulsi include • Asthma • Cough&Cold

• Bronchitis • Fever • Hiccups • Arthritis • Eye diseases • Genito urinary disorders • Skin diseases • Ringworm • Insect bites • Malaria • Anxiety • Stress Science has just begun to confirm its medicinal properties and its extract is used in many Ayurvedic medicines available in the market including cough syrups..

Several scientific studies have been con-

ducted on Tulsi plant and these studies reveal that it has a unique combination of pharmacological actions against many diseases and has antimicrobial (anti-bacterial, anti-fungal and antiviral) properties.

In addition to this, It has cognitive and memory enhancing properties. It can relieve stress and psychological disorders like anxiety and depression. It also effectively reduces organ stress caused by external pollutants and prevent the development of stress related diseases. Physicians recommend regular consumption of Tulsi tea as an essential lifestyle practice.

Use of Tulsi (Holy Basil) as a Culinary Herb The use of Basil as a culinary herb is well-known.The varieties that are used mostly for culinary purposes are Sweet Basil (Ocimum Bacilicum). Holy Basil (Thulsi) are also used while preparing dishes to enhance its taste and flavour. It is added mainly to soups, desserts, herbal drinks and teas. Leaves are added to fruit dishes as seasoning and often used with vinegar and olive oil.

Seeds when soaked has gelatinous property and are used in deserts and drinks such as sherbet and faluda. It can be used fresh, frozen or dried. As it is one of the few herbs that increase the flavour when heated, it is only used with discretion.

Thulsi as Part of Spirituality Worshiping Thulsi is an age old custom existed in Indian Hindu families and they used Thulsi leaves as part of their spiritual rituals. In front of each Hindu family, there would be a Thulsi plant and they would water it, light a lamp near it and worship it in the belief that it would protect the whole family from evils and bring good luck to them.They often planted it in special pots or Thulsi Thara (Thulsi Vrindavan).

Thulsi Thara is a traditional masonry structure constructed in the centre of the central courtyard of most Hindu families specially for planting Thulsi.

The different names of Thulsi are derived from Hindu Mythology and all are related to Lord Vishnu.

Thuls’s Names Related to Lord Vishnu • Vishnu Thulsi (Beloved of Vishnu) • Vishnu Vallabha ( Beloved of Vishnu) • Vaishnavi (Belonging to Vishnu) • Varieties of Thulsi Used for Spiritual Purposes • Shri Thulsi or Rama Thulsi – Thulsi with green leaves.

• Krishna Thulsi or Shyama Thulsi –Thulsi with purple leaves and stem.

‘She’ represents ‘Lakshmi’ who is

considered as the principal consort of ‘Lord Vishnu’. ‘Rama’ and ‘Krishna’ are prominent Avatars of Vishnu. Since the purple colour is similar to Krishna’s dark complexion, Krisna Thulsi is considered especially sacred for ‘Lord Krishna’.

Growing Tulsi (Holy Basil) Basil is an annual plant and generally grows up to 12-14 inches. Its height and shape of leaves differ according to its variety.It grows well in nutrient rich, well-drained and slightly acidic soil.

Sunlight, heat and regular watering are the basic requirements for Basils to grow well. It always needs warm conditions and will not tolerate cold.

Neem benefits,neem uses for skin,hair and Health benefits of Neem (Indian Lilac) It can be grown indoors or out. It can also be planted in pots or windowboxes and grows well in large pots under the right conditions like light, heat and daily watering. For the holy basil to grow as a compact little bush in your pot, do not let it bloom or seed.

Instead pinch out the plant tops.

Basil have the ability to repel flies, insects and mosquitos. Due to the germicidal properties and the ability to repel flies, basils are planted among tomatoes in the garden for overcoming both insects and diseases.

The fragrance and properties of Tulsi varies according to the quantities and types of the essential oils contained in it. Eugenol, methyl chavicol, citral, linalool, cineol and methyl cinnamate, camphene and anethole are the important essential oils contained in Basil varieties.

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Nanotechnology: a blessing or a curse for developing nations?

Nanoparticles are increasingly being explored for boosting crops and nutrition, but doubts remain over their long-term safety, writes Mico Tatalovic.

P

roponents of nanotechnology say it will revolutionise farming and global food systems, with applications being explored that could cut waste, make food safer and help create ‘super crops’ that escape the controversial label of genetically modified organisms (GMOs).

If successful, it could help to overcome poor yields, malnutrition and opposition to GMOs – all of which are still large challenges in the global South.

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The science of nanotech is cutting-edge but simple enough to be affordable globally. And the development prospect is huge.

So it’s no surprise that many developing countries have already embarked on commercialising the technology.

But the blossoming of this relatively new technology also raises concerns about its long-term safety to human health and the environment, with many scientists calling for better and more internationally coordinated regulation and oversight of the proliferating uses of nanoparticles.

Developing nations have been left out of conversations about nanotech regulation, and there is still a need for better regulation of the technology at a national and global level to ensure the technology meets

the needs of the poor with minimum risk to people.

So, what are the latest ideas in using nanotech in food security, what can it do, and what are the safety fears surrounding it?

The term nanotechnology generally refers to any use of nano-scale particles (between 1 and 100 nanometres). Their tiny size gives them unusual properties that can affect texture, appearance and flavour of foods – and they are already used as food additives.

New products containing these particles are also being explored to make biodegradable packaging, improve shelf life and prevent food poisoning and waste.

For example, nano sensors in food packag-

ing could soon tell you if food was exposed to sunlight and therefore degraded in quality.

Some scientists are planning to use it to improve nutrition. They are studying the use of nano emulsions — oil in water mixtures with tiny droplets — as excipients (foods that improve the bioactivity of foods ingested with them). These could increase our intake of nutrients from fruit and veg — a use that is especially promising in tackling malnutrition and micronutrient deficiency.

The idea is to spray these on food to allow us to extract more nutrients. Similar nano emulsions are being explored for their antimicrobial activity to protect crops and foods from going off.

“Nanotechnology will be pretty ubiquitous in the coming decades in all sorts of products,” says Markita del Carpio Landry, physicist at the University of California, Berkeley, in the United States.

Boosting crop resilience Scientists are even investigating use of nanomaterials to improve delivery of fertilisers and pesticides, and to create transgenic crops that would not be considered GM. Sonia Trigueros, a researcher at Britain’s University of Oxford believes its “applications are limitless”.

Landry’s team is exploring the use of carbon nanotubes — long, narrow, stiff tubes of carbon — to alter plant genes without foreign DNA being inserted into the plant genome itself, which would lead to gene-edited crops that would not be considered genetically modified. Given the large and ongoing public opposition to genetically modified crops in developing nations, this approach could be a more palatable way to deliver benefits such as drought or flood resistance.

The team recently showed that carbon nanotubes can be used to deliver gene-editing machinery known as CRISPR/Cas9 inside plant cells — through the cell wall and the membrane — something that is otherwise tricky to do.

Gene editing then allows precise genetic enhancement to create crops that are resistant to herbicides, insects, diseases and drought. It has the potential to make better crops without the kind of public fears surrounding genetic modification.

Landry says that the approach would

actually be cheaper than current methods used for genetic modification of crops, such as the gene gun – a device for delivering DNA to cells, or Agrobacterium bacteria used for gene transfer between cells.

“We calculated the cost of nanoparticle-based transformations over gene gun or Agrobacterium,” she says. “The costs are less for nanoparticles because they can be synthesised on a bulk scale.”

“Additionally,” she says, “the nanoparticles do not require refrigeration, as does Agrobacterium, or advanced-tech laboratory equipment for use, as would a gene

No one knows if, and how, safe they are in the long term since most safety research has been done in the lab, on cells or mice, and in unrealistic settings. “We cannot say ‘oh, we’re totally safe’ – we need to work on that: we need to do better protocols to see toxicity,” says Trigueros.

Zahra Rattray, fellow at Scotland’s University of Strathclyde, says: “I’ve worked on projects where there was definite harm, and I’ve also reviewed some recent publications that have not been published yet and there was clear evidence from their work that there was a toxic

gun, so their use is possible in limitedresource environments.”

effect of these particles.”

A 2017 review of the safety of nanoparticles in food concluded that some of them could have a “harmful effect” and that better tests of these effects were “urgently needed”.

Potential harmful effects include the leaching of silver nanoparticles used in packaging into foods, which could kill off good bacteria in the gut.

Another example is titanium dioxide, TiO2, also known as E171 and used as food whitener, which has been shown to (cont on page no. 30)

Health and safety fears But against this march of technology, some people have been increasingly worried about the lack of long-term studies on the impact of nanomaterials on human health — and the environment.

“The transparency and vigilance against the risk are too limited,” says Mathilde Detcheverry, head of information at Avicenn, a French NGO campaigning for open information on nanotechnology.

“We’re still in the dark.”

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by Sahana Ghosh

rn Tu

Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia in Italy’s port city of Genoa is making bioplastics from agro-waste. The institute has tied up with the city’s central vegetable market for sourcing raw material.

ing o agr nd

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Environment & people

T

he use of agro-waste to churn out biodegradable plastics aligns with the concept of a circular economy and may address the crop residue burning in India.

India’s IIT Guwahati, among others, is also working on environment-friendly plastics.

Bioplastics are not silver bullets to the plastic pollution menace, but they are promising. The main reasons preventing widespread use of bioplastics are the costs involved, challenges in making the plastics biodegradable and applicability in a range of products.

In Italy’s ancient port city of Genoa, a laboratory table at Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia (IIT) laden with green, brown and orange heaps of powder may remind one of Holi, India’s festival of colours. But this is a scene of cutting-edge research on crafting biodegradable plastics out of agro-waste, a component whose poor management in India is a root cause of air pollution.

These powders, derived from fruit and vegetable waste, are the raw materials for bioplastics fabricated by the researchers at IIT Genoa’s Smart Materials lab part of the team composed by Giovanni Perotto, Ilker Bayer and Athanassia Athanassiou.

Bioplastics are derived from renewable, plant-based sources such as vegetable plants and oils, wood chips, etc., and are a potential alternative to fossil-fuel derived plastics.

At IIT Genoa, researchers transform these powders to bioplastics of varying flexibility and mechanical strength using an eco-friendly water-based method.

So while bright green powdered parsley and spinach stems became soft and stretchable plastic films,

rice husks yielded more robust and less flexible version of bioplastics.

“Our main approach is to use waste material from agriculture such as fruit and vegetable peels, inedible parts of fruits and vegetables and unsold fruit and vegetables.

We have established a strong collaboration with the central vegetable market of Genoa, as well as with other producers,” said Despina Fragouli, team leader at the Smart Materials lab.

“We developed a technology for the direct transformation of inedible agro waste into bioplastics,” Fragouli said.

Fragouli discussed the research on eco-friendly smart materials with a visiting delegation of science journalists, including this Mongabay-India correspondent, during a field trip organised alongside the World Conference of Science Journalists, 2019 in July.

The technology developed by IIT, Genoa breathes new life into cellulose-rich vegetable and fruit waste and aligns with the idea of a circular economy where a strategy of reduction, reuse and recycling of elements drives resource utilisation.

From powder to plastic These bioplastics, which are being promoted as biodegradable and environmentally friendly, can be produced in two ways, including a water-based process.

“In the first one, we blend the agro-waste powders with variable amounts of biopolymeric material and then we make objects by processes widely applied in the industry such as melt extrusion, injection moulding or by mould casting,” Fragouli told MongabayIndia in a follow-up email.

“The amount of agro-waste

component can reach 70-80 percent by weight in the biocomposites. So in the final composite, a very small amount of polymer is actually acting as a glue to keep the powder particles together,” Fragouli said.

In the second method, the waste powders are simply mixed with specific solvents or water of defined pH without the addition of any other components.

“The solvent ‘attacks’ and destroys the crystallinity of the cellulose components of the wastes, resulting in homogeneous solutions, and after casting and solvent evaporation, homogeneous plastic films are formed,” Fragouli said.

It can take from a few minutes to a few hours to arrive at the final product.

Depending on the plant species, biopolymers display diverse mechanical properties ranging from brittleness and

broken down into non-toxic byproducts.

“Plastics biodegrade at highly variable rates that span from few months to few years. The bioplastics break down into lowweight and non-toxic byproducts. We have proved that our biocomposites are biodegradable either in landfills or even in home composting conditions or even in the sea. The production is not energy-intensive and they are not costly,” said Fragouli.

The time needed for biodegradation depends on the temperature and humidity of the environment and the properties of the plastic component added Fragouli. For instance, crystalline plastics require more time compared to amorphous plastics.

Can bioplastics help in the management of crop waste?

Indian polymer scientist Vimal Katiyar sees an opportunity in using agricultural

500 million tons of agricultural and agroindustrial residues are generated annually in the country. And nearly seventy percent of these residues are used as fodder, as fuel for domestic and industrial sectors and other economic purposes.

However, in the absence of adequate, sustainable management practices, around 92 metric tons of crop waste (biomass) is burned every year in India, causing air pollution.

In India, action on beating plastic pollution has been at the centre of attention of the central and several state governments.

But results have varied across states.

rigidity (such as rice husk polymers) to softness and stretchability (parsley stems).

Because of the mild conditions of the fabrication process, the colour of the starting vegetables stay preserved in the bioplastics, the researcher explained.

Functional properties of the source material, like antioxidant capabilities and even odour are retained.

Upon cradling the circular patches of bioplastics, one notices a delicate fragrance, reminiscent of their source: a slightly peppery note of turmeric in one film and a toasty whiff of coffee off a brown coloured bioplastic.

Once produced, the bioplastics can be

wastes (biomass) for designing a diversified range of bioplastics. He says it could boost management of crop waste.

“One way to look at the crop burning issue in India is to use these wastes for bioplastics and biofuels,” suggested Katiyar, the coordinator for Centre of Excellence for Sustainable Polymers at India’s Indian Institute of Technology, Guwahati.

“This could also tie in with the biorefinery idea which means transforming biomass to energy and other beneficial byproducts including bioplastics and biofuels,” said Katiyar.

India’s Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) estimates say that about

sion of greenhouse gasses during production, they are far from the silver bullet to the plastic pile-up problem. For one, bioplastics can be more energy-intensive during manufacture than their conventional competitors.

Further, there is scepticism regarding their biodegradability: are they just as harmful as conventional plastics.

Bioplastics can also be relatively expensive to produce than their conventional counterparts.

But Katiyar reasons that the investment in bioplastics is worth the money and time since they biodegrade faster whereas conventional plastics break down in 400 years.

Effective solution or an attempt at greenwashing?

Though bioplastics are considered as a sustainable solution due to the low emis-

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“Prices will also go down due to the extensive research on production processes happening across the world,” he said.

Currently, bioplastics represent about one percent of the about 320 million tons of plastic produced annually. But with rising demand and with more sophisticated materials, applications and products emerging, the market is already growing each year.

Katiyar acknowledged the three most pressing challenges globally in the widespread adoption of bioplastics.

“While biodegradability is an advantage, we need to get them to break down in open environments in a safe manner.

Usually, some of the successful plastics of this class need appropriate infrastructure

such as high temperature composting facilities to degrade. Secondly, they are not heat stable. And bioplastics for food packaging must be able to provide a barrier to oxygen permeation, so the food doesn’t spoil. The commercially available biodegradable plastics do not adequately fulfill this criterion,” Katiyar explained.

The researcher and his colleagues have taken on these challenges head-on. The growing repertoire of biodegradable products from their lab comprises of items ranging from cutlery, household furniture to a variety of biopolymers (such as polylactic acid) from feedstock such as cassava waste and sugarcane juice.

At present, Katiyar and his team are

(page no. 19 cont...) ways of moving water, including trucking it, pushcarts and bottled water.

The second is addressing the intermittence of water supply and variations in water pressure. "Predictability will speak to water anxiety," said Beard. "If done well, it can reduce the cost of water, because people don't need to queue, people don't need to hoard."

Although India is dependent upon the monsoons for the periodic refilling of its reservoirs, Beard said that countries with less rainfall than India still manage a 24x7 water supply, even through the summer months. She pointed to the loss of what is called non-revenue water: treated water that is put into the system and lost before revenue can be collected on it.

Globally, 20%-50% of treated water is lost as non-revenue water. She suggested that installing water meters for all households and regular maintenance and repair of the piped water network would go a long way in checking these losses.

The third is making water more affordable. For this, there is the example of free basic water in South Africa, where access to water is a constitutional right and every household gets 9 cubic metres of water for free. There are also other innovations that could apply to water pricing, including incremental tariffs based on usage, cross-subsidies with other services and targeted subsidies to particular neighbourhoods.

Lastly, the authors recommend working with informal settlements to improve their conditions rather than displacing them. In Colombo, for instance, the Samurdhi programme in the 1990s initiated policies for improving slums which were re-labelled as "under-served settlement". Today, almost 98% of the city has access to piped water, if not at the household level then at least in a shared yard.

"When you look at all the upgrading efforts in the Global South, [working with informal settlements] has been one of the most effective methods for getting low-income households access to water and sanitation," said Beard.

(Source: scroll.in) Environment & people

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working on a process that makes bioplastics that can easily breakdown in the soil.

“Our products have also passed the hot beverage test and can be used to store hot drinks, unlike most bioplastic items.

Production costs may also lower when compared to the other biodegradable plastic producers in the world once produced in industrial scale. So far, we have been producing few kilograms of biodegradable plastic at one time but we are now experimenting with a tonnes per year capacity pilot plant,” he added.

(page no. 27 cont...) accumulate in tissues of rats and to have toxic effects at certain doses. However, other studies have found it is not toxic and the industry that makes the material claims it is safe.

Uncertainty remains, partly because the effects of nanoparticles depend on a wide range of complex and intertwined factors, including their size, structure, coating, dose, as well as what they are consumed with.

“There is no doubt more research into the toxicity of these things should be carried out,” says Sowmya Purushothaman, researcher at University of California, Merced.

Regulatory vacuum The absence of sound scientific protocols is a problem for policymakers and regulators.

“There’s a total lack of regulation,” Rattray says.

Uncertainty and lack of data means it is difficult to regulate – or even know whether to regulate nanoparticles specifically, beyond the existing food safety and regulation laws. Such laws are generally more stringent in the developed world, so developing nations are especially

exposed.

“Unfortunately, we don’t have proper standards yet for regulating nanoparticles,” says Kiruba Krishnaswamy, bioengineer at the University of Missouri, US. “There is no one single method to analyse a nanoparticle. There is no common ground or a dialogue.”

Experts say the issue calls for an international perspective, including developing nations.

“There should be an international harmonisation of all that is happening, all the data that is being collected, where we are and what are the steps that we need to make sure it is safe for the next 20 to 30 years,” says Krishnaswamy.

In addition to the concerns over safety of food additives, there are also emerging concerns about environmental impacts.

Marie Simonin, researcher at the Institute of Research for Development, in Montpellier, France, says that some metal nanoparticles were assumed to be stable and non-toxic based on lab tests, but later found to be dissolved by microbes in natural systems, leading to toxic effects.

(Source: scidev.net)

India's Coal Power Plants Need Rs 86,135 Crore to Comply With Emission Standards: Study The study says that without the necessary technology, pollutants will cause an estimated 1.3 million deaths in India per year by 2050.

I

ndia's coal-fired thermal power plants will need as much as Rs 86,135 crore to install the pollution control technology that will ensure that the country's emission standards are met with, a joint study by the International Institute for Sustainable Development and the Council on Energy, Environment and Water has found.

This cost estimate, which Quartz India has called "the most conservative" yet, comes almost two years after the December 7, 2017 deadline to comply with the environmental standards has gone, with nearly all plants in the country missing it.

A Greenpeace India report published late in 2018 had noted that had the guidelines notified by the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change in 2015 been followed, then nearly 76,000 premature deaths could have been avoided in the three years since then. Meanwhile,

G20 countries increased their subsidy to coal-fired power plants by almost three times between 2013 and 2017, another report found.

When coal is burned to produced electricity, it releases particulate matter (PM4), sulphur oxides (like SO2), nitrogen oxides (NOx) and mercury. It is to manage these emissions that technology must be installed in India's many coal-based thermal power plants. If not, the latest study says that pollutants will cause an estimated 1.3 million deaths in India per year by 2050.

The report also assesses that non-compliance with emission norms may result in around 3.2 lakh premature deaths and 5.1 crore hospital admission cases due to respiratory disorders between 2019 and 2030.

Coal-based plants account for 80% of the thermal emissions in the country, the Quartz report says. India has as many as 441 plants. As many as 22 of them are owned by the government's National Thermal Power Corporation Limited, a fact which has not resulted in them complying any more than the other private-owned firms.

A case in point of the above is the fact highlighted in the report that of the 441

plants, only two have commissioned flue gas desulphurization technology, which lowers sulphur dioxide emissions by over 90%.

The latest study also portends a hike in the tariff to substantiate the costs of such technology. The estimate comes down to Rs 73,176 crore, it says, if plants which are to be retired by 2027 are excluded from setting up the technological safeguards.

"This will add between Rs 0.32 per kilowatt hour (a measure of energy) to Rs 0.72 per kilowatt hour for coal power plants depending on the size of the unit and other factors. On account of remaining useful life and more stringent requirements, the average 500 megawatt units face the steepest tariff increases. In most cases, more than 80% of the tariff increase will be in the form of a fixed cost. The variable component in all cases adds less than Rs 0.1 per kilowatt hour," the report says.

The report adds that distribution companies will most likely pass on these higher costs to electricity consumers. It notes that these companies are already facing financial pressures arising from technical and commercial losses going into crores.

Here, the hindrance posed by regulated consumer tariffs is highlighted. The report mentions that prevalent laws shroud the question of whether power producers and then distribution companies can recover the cost of pollution control equipment from customers.

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The study further advices that all customers, other than the poor, be encouraged to pay tariffs that reflect the cost of supplying coal, including that of pollution control technologies. It also recognises that tariff increases are bureaucratic processes which require time that the industry cannot afford to lose now.

In even worse news for India's hopes to comply with its own pollution standards, the report identifies as a "major barrier" the inadequate practical experience of the country's power producers. This inexperience is reflected in their method of "choosing, installing, commissioning and operating pollution-control technologies," it says.

(Source: thewire.in)

(page no. 15 cont...) livelihood pressures which take precedence. "In such cases, it may be necessary to develop alternatives to the household and livelihood needs for plant products, especially firewood and fodder. For instance, we have seen that villages with better access to gas cylinders and electricity depend less on firewood. They don't stop using firewood since it has cultural significance but the quantum of use decreases," added Menon.

Both the forest department and van panchayats should work together to devise appropriate solutions that would consider both the interests of forest dwellers and also conservation of birds, emphasises Menon.

"We are also trying to encourage local communities to capitalise on the increased bird tourism in Uttarakhand by setting up homestays or initiating bird-based tourism, thus creating alternative livelihoods and reducing dependence on forest products," added Menon. "There are a few such initiatives in the state that we aim to emulate, where interested local participants were trained in the necessary bird identification skills, as well as language and people skills, and are now guiding groups of bird-watchers and photographers through their own backyards."

(Source: india.mongabay.com)

(page no. 23 cont...) creates a negative image in the mind of fellow travelers from different parts of the world.

The reason for emphasizing Triund and Kheerganga, is primarily because these are comparatively easy treks which can be done in a day or two and don’t need too much of trekking gears or heavy prep. What was once a quaint little camping ground has now become a public camping ground with tents and toilets fixed permanently.

As responsible travelers, one must keep their actions in control and avoid littering any of the places they travel to.

Seeing that we don’t litter and keep our trash in our bags instead of dumping it, the other passer by tourists will also observe it and start implementing it. By de-cluttering is how we will be able to restore the natural beauty of these beautiful destinations.

(Source: medium.com) Environment & people

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Eco

Quotes We won’t have a society if we destroy the environment.

– Margaret Mead Environment is no one’s property to destroy; it’s everyone’s responsibility to protect.

– Mohith Agadi We don’t have to sacrifice a strong economy for a healthy environment.

– Dennis Weaver A nation that destroys its soils destroys itself. Forests are the lungs of our land, purifying the air and giving fresh strength to our people. ?

Franklin D. Roosevelt What is the use of a house if you haven’t got a tolerable planet to put it on?

Henry David Thoreau Saving our planet, lifting people out of poverty, advancing economic growth… these are one and the same fight. We must connect the dots between climate change, water scarcity, energy shortages, global health, food security and women’s empowerment. Solutions to one problem must be solutions for all.

– Ban Ki-moon If all mankind were to disappear, the world would regenerate back to the rich state of equilibrium that existed ten thousand years ago. If insects were to vanish, the environment would collapse into chaos.

E. O. Wilson What we are doing to the forests of the world is but a mirror reflection of what we are doing to ourselves and to one another. ?

Chris Maser Our planet’s alarm is going off, and it is time to wake up and take action!

– Leonardo DiCaprio To waste, to destroy our natural resources, to skin and exhaust the land instead of using it so as to increase its usefulness, will result in undermining in the days of our children the very prosperity which we ought by right to hand down to them amplified and developed.

Theodore Roosevelt Sooner or later, we will have to recognise that the Earth has rights, too, to live without pollution. What mankind must know is that human beings cannot live without Mother Earth, but the planet can live without humans.

– Evo Morales Earth provides enough to satisfy every man’s needs, but not every man’s greed.

Mahatma Gandhi

Eco Facts Biogas is a gas produced when organic waste undergoes anaerobic digestion -- biodegradable material breaking down in the absence of oxygen.

The gas is then piped into homes for cooking or for lighting gas lamps. The fermented remains become bio-slurry, a cost-free, all-purpose fertiliser.

Eco

IQ

1. What colourless/colorless, odourless/odorless, poisonous polluting gas is chiefly emitted by small engines typically used in lawn-mowers and chainsaws, etc?

This process takes place in a biogas digester. BIRU engages local NGOs to help rural communities build the digesters, which range in size and price.

“The potential of biogas is great in Indonesia because of the enormous quantity of cattle. A large amount of cows, pigs, fowls and other agricultural waste is available,” says Wilhemus Leang, a provincial coordinator for Yayasan Rumah Energi.

Theresia Rukyatun runs a small milk-producing business in Yogyakarta, Indonesia. She invested in a biogas digester when she built her cattle farm. “Our goal is modest, to be energy efficient,” she says.

Because her farm pasteurises their own milk before it is packed and sold, production costs are high, especially since hers is a small business. She used to spend 1.5 million to 2 million rupiah (US$110 to US$150) a month on liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) on pasteurisation alone.

2. What highly toxic element was traditionally used in thermometers, posing a substantial safety and disposal risk?

3. The 1987 Montreal Protocol concerns specifically, and includes in its full title, substances that deplete what?

4. Carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, and sulphur/sulfur hexafluoride are widely referred to by what collective metaphorical term?

5. From the Greek root words for 'house' and 'study of' what term refers to the scientific study of the relationship between living things, and their natural environment?

6. An 'R number' identifies what sort of substance having potentially significant impact on global warming when used in heating/cooling applications?

7. If electricity costs say 5p (or 5 cents) per kilowatt/hour, how much does a conventional 100W light bulb cost to run in a year if it is left on permanently?

Now, with biogas, Theresia does not need to pay for LPG for production. The money she saves translates into more benefits for her employees.

8. The DuPont trade name Freon has become an alternative name for which

“We can increase their salary, and we can invest more in our storage,” she says.

9. The 'R-value' used in the building and construction industry is a measure

Theresia is not the only one benefitting from biogas.

Throughout Indonesia, many farmers and small-business owners are using biogas in different ways.

These include tofu and tempe producers, goat farmers, fish farmers and many more.

“We farmers actually have a lot of resources around us,” says Theresia. “All we need to do is manage our farming waste.”

abbreviated compound name strongly associated with global warming?

of what quality of a materials: Life expectancy; Cost; Thermal resistance; or Tensile strength?

10. Which three of these waste products are safe and helpful to compost (and by exception which are not): Dairy products, Egg shells, Sawdust, Lard, Fish bones, Tea-bags, Pet waste?

11. The UN Stockholm Convention signed in 2001 seeks to limit the production and use of what, abbreviated to POPs? 12. In excess of how many gallons of water are lost each day in the USA to

BIRU hopes that more farmers and business owners like Theresia will start becoming more sustainable in their practices.

leaks, equating to 14% of all 'withdrawals': Six million, Sixty million, Six hundred million; or Six billion?

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Sword of Damocles Millions of children are expected to join the global climate strike today, urging politicians to take action to prevent the climate catastrophe hanging over our heads.

Tree of Life The tree of life is burning.

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RNI - 63997/94