Impact assessment and better management of ecosystems....

The rising demand for processed food products like sugar, coffee and tea has grown and is attracting a lot of investments in the agro and food processing industries, tying up commercial agriculture to economic development. Agro based industries are water intensive and have serious impacts on the environment Enforcing stringent environmental standards on these high impact industries could act as an impetus to place India as one of the serious players in the world market of commodities. Most of the processed foods require sugar and sugar industry in India requires serious environment management to compete in the global market.

Sugarcane, as a crop is responsible for severe biodiversity lost as sugarcane growers destroy habitats to make way for plantations resulting in substantial soil degradation. This fact is evidenced by the visible destruction of the Great Barrier Reef, off the coast of Australia, and the Everglades of Florida, where flourishing ecosystems have been destroyed due to indiscriminate use of fertilizers and illegal discharge of waste water into these water bodies.

Sugar mills, most often, located in countries with large population of poor people, release foul odours and emissions discharging substantial amounts of waste water, causing fertilizer run-off leading to decreasing levels of soil fertility. These adverse impacts can be mitigated through use of sustainable technologies and promotion of Better Management Practices (BMPs) within the sugar industry.

WWF report on improving farming and processing practices in the sugar industry.

BMPs, as tools, reduce the negative impacts of produce on natural resources in a sustainable way and enhance the value of such resources. BMPs used in the production process of sugar are developed through partnerships with various stakeholders. They tend to increase rural incomes of millers through increased yields and sustained soil health, benefiting businesses that consume sugar as a raw material.

Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) reports prepared on behalf of upcoming or existing sugar mills require environmental monitoring that extends all through the year although sugar milling is a seasonal activity. It is imperative that EIA reports be comprehensive enough to be presented for public hearing at the initial stages of any project and useful to adopt BMPs along the way. The report shall reflect a comparative note on pollutant levels in effluents monitored against those set by the World Bank for the sugar industry.

The EIA report so prepared should reflect a cost-benefit analysis of the environmental impacts, implementation of mitigation measures, availability of global technologies which can help project proponents assess the economic viability of a project. With specific reference to sugar mills, the reports should carry details of the pollution control equipments installed for treatment of flyash from molasses, bagasse, dust fall, liquid wastes and disposal methods of solid wastes, details relating to handling of lime sludge, press mud, bagasse, spentwash and processing of all by-products in the EIA report increasing the scope for improvement in pollution prevention measures. The report shall indicate waste minimization practices that include recycling, reusing effluent water, condensate and cooling water, declare any leakage in valves, glands and pipes to stop wastage and reduce water consumption. These are just the bare essentials of an EIA report prepared for a sugar mill.

An Environmental Management Plan (EMP) lists out mitigation measures specific to the location of the sugar mill, tillage practices, soil fertility and degradation levels of cropland. An EMP should endeavor in implementing technical, social and institutional measures for mitigation and provide methods to compensate the loss of natural resources and biodiversity. It should reflect the details of investments made towards research and development of green harvesting methods.


Environmental auditing, policy statements and management systems.

Meeting sustainability challenges in road construction....

Bad roads definitely add to inflation. Good roads reflect a government's genuine concern for its citizens. There arises to need to assess the strength of our infrastructure to cut losses and improve safety and ease of travel.

Adopting sustainability practices in road construction projects.


Environmental Sustainability in Road Construction Projects

Gaining access to Environmental Justice....

The Access Initiative (TAI), a leader in promoting "access rights" to information, justice and public participation, published a collaborative research work on the establishment of environmental courts and tribunals. The work highlights the need for specialized Environmental Courts and Tribunals (ECTs) and helps those who involved in creating or improving such ECTs by advising decision making authorities on the selection and appointment of tribunal members.

Greening Justice:Creating Environmental Courts and Tribunals

Greening, a challenge and an opportunity....

Principles of Responsible Product Stewardship.

Pursuing 'product stewardship' as a principle, helps corporates move towards sustainability where all stakeholders involved in the complete life-cycle of a product assume responsibility for its impact on human health and environment. A move to eliminate greenhouse gas emissions entails limiting the use of raw materials within a process and reducing generation of waste in the cycle of production. The principle requires a fundamental change in the product and the way its processes are designed. It includes a complete assessment of all inputs that go into the making of a product and explores the manner in which customers use and dispose of the product at the end of its life-cycle. As an environmental policy, corporates need to appoint experts in conservation and pollution prevention as their board members policy and adopt an Asset Recycle Management program (ARM). The ARM envisages a re-manufacturing process that allows parts and components of a product to be reconditioned, tested and reassembled with minimal environmental impact,

Strategies to attain sustainability include product stewardship, quality management aimed at pollution prevention and investments in clean technologies. Pollution prevention contemplates colocation of facilities that are geographically dispersed, creating industrial ecosystems where the waste from one process becomes the raw material for another, while recycling the waste so generated becomes less expensive. Using geothermal facilities to generate zero emission renewable energy as an alternative to fossil fuel power generation, evolution of products and services using new or enhanced competencies, public policy innovations and alteration of consumption patterns form a valuable part of a country’s sustainability vision. Ultimately, corporations or world's enterprises are the only entities that have the resources, technology and global reach to attain sustainability. This step forward
requires a business sense that moves beyond social, ethical and political constraints in attaining sustainable development.


Seeking Corporate partnership in the upkeep of the environment.

Ecological choices....

Sustainability as a business strategy.

Climate Change and Scientific integrity....

Scientific evidence for anthropogenic climate change is clinching and questioned by very few critics, yet, the extent to which climate scientists enjoy public support remains unclear. Climategate scandal over leaked e-mails at the University of East Anglia, UK and the flawed IPCC report has certainly eroded some of the trust and despite these uncertainties public confidence on climate scientists and theories of global warming has not declined. Amidst confusion and skepticism that prevails over claims of anthropogenic climate change, scientists and researchers are hoping governments engage in climate talks at a political level to achieve necessary results including a post-Kyoto climate agreement. Political leaders are expected to take decisions based on scientific evidence and geopolitical equations rather than political aspirations. Any political interference that undermines the scientific integrity of environmental policy-making could debilitate our response to climate change, at a time when it is needed the most.

Scientific integrity in Climate Change

 
Policy makers need accurate and credible data on climate change to make possible a prompt and diligent public action on global warming. Most of the scientific research is publicly funded and it is only pertinent that scientific content be subjected to peer-review process as a quality-control measure over scientific content. Media policies driven by the aspirations of the scientific community could protect scientists from any adverse reaction to findings. Scientists today believe in engaging the public in order to achieve proper dissemination and analysis of information even as they freely debate and amend their views without fear of retaliation. A regulatory process that uses notice and comment provision is one way by which inputs from the public can be sought on scientific publications on climate change to ensure transparency and effective action. Individual and institutional leadership that creates awareness and spurs behavioral change among citizens and businesses in favor of reducing greenhouse gas emissions can make a huge difference to climate science.

Business leaders and climate leadership....

Wal-Mart CEO Lee Scott, in one of his speeches, said "For us, there is virtually no distinction between being a responsible citizen and a successful business.....they are one and the same for Wal-Mart today." It is the CEOs who set the vision for environmental strategies and take small businesses forward without really compromising on environmental values and this global community cannot afford to lose momentum over the environmental movement. Business leaders are seen making serious attempts to attenuate the environmental impacts of their businesses and reduce the carbon footprints of their activities. Organizations that produce eco-friendly products need not lose their edge over their competitors who are yet to evolve strategies to improve their environmental efficiencies. Environmental performance and sustainability come with a certain cost, a cost, which is recovered when consumers opt for eco-friendly products. Business leaders are bound to emerge as climate leaders as they innovate to reduce any environmental impact even as they comply and conform their businesses to the tenets of ecological science. Climate leaders need to sensitize their governments about enhancing their commitments on emissions reduction and help forge public-private partnerships.

Economy of esteem and climate change...

No problem can withstand the assault of sustained thinking, and climate change requires sustained innovation. We have reached a situation where developing countries and Least Developed Countries (LDCs) need an overarching climate treaty which recognizes their right to sustainable development, access to funds for mitigation and adaptation activities. In our failure to achieve a post-Kyoto agreement we could end up forcing an international climate regime to fall victim to political complacency. This lack of political commitment to fight global warming could render the future of international climate regime very bleak.

The failure of national leaders to execute a post-Kyoto climate agreement would reflect the collective insensitivity of developed nations to the plight of LDCs that need food and water security, and work towards alleviation of poverty in these nations. There are nations whose citizens are losing their habitats to climate change and the absence of law to protect these 'climate refugees' makes them much more vulnerable to the debilitating effects of climate change. The lack of any initiative to protect these citizens is evident from the fact that the United Nations is yet to define the term ‘climate refugee' and list out guidelines to protect the right of these refugees to seek environmental asylum in other countries.


There is more to a climate treaty than mere assent to ‘legally binding commitments on emission reductions'. Global warming through sensible and serious participation of nations and its leaders and by offering incentives for effective climate leadership. They call it the ‘economy of esteem for climate change’. The link below gives a political analysis on the 'how and why' of a post-2012 climate change architecture.  

State of international climate treaty post-Kyoto

Seeing REDD in a post-Kyoto framework..

Illegal logging, an obstacle in the race to reduce deforestation

Deforestation of tropical forests releases more carbon than forests outside the tropics. According to IPCC, the carbon mitigating benefits of reducing deforestation are far greater than the benefits of afforestation. Tropical forests account for almost half of the world’s forest area, holding as much carbon in their vegetation and soils as temperate-zone and boreal forests. Trees in tropical forests hold about 50% more carbon per hectare than trees outside the tropics.

Forest management includes maintenance of forest carbon stocks, sustainable harvesting of forest products and equitable distribution of forest wealth among the indigenous people. Climate change regime could increase incursions into the territories of indigenous people without any scope for their participation in forestry activities and harvesting of forestry products. The Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues made recommendations required that new proposals for avoided deforestation or reduced emissions from deforestation address the need for global and national policy reforms guided by the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

Reducing deforestation can mitigate the adverse effects of climate change substantially and for this reason, land, land-use changes and forestry or LULUCF that comprises all land-use activities needs to given utmost importance under a post-2012 climate agreement. Article 3 of the Kyoto Protocol has created a framework for future negotiations although it had left unresolved, critical issues relating to LULUCF and its emissions accounting.

A post-Kyoto climate agreement must address 'avoided deforestation' to achieve the goals set to reduce global warming. Climate change cannot be tackled without addressing issues relevant to avoided deforestation and including them in international climate agreements, a policy known as the Reduced Emissions and Forest Degradation or REDD. REDD can tackle climate change, alleviate poverty and conserve biodiversity. Among many concepts evolved to reduce emissions from deforestation, 'compensated reduction' is recommended to reduce substantial emissions from deforestation facilitating developing country participation in the Kyoto Protocol framework. To implement the compensated reduction plan, governments need to adopt domestic policies that deter private landowners from deforesting their lands.


India, believed that the concept of compensated reduction favored nations with high deforestation rates and therefore proposed the concept of ‘compensated conservation’ that rewards countries for maintaining and increasing their forests as a result of conservation. It also believed that a voluntary fund or enabling fund is required to support capacity building and REDD activities.

The Amazon fund established by Brazilian government supports efforts to reduce deforestation rates by 70% by 2018 through enforcing logging restrictions and land-title reform. Many economists believe that international forest preservation projects be part of global efforts to fight climate change and that industrialized nations need to contribute to this Fund to protect the region from greenhouse gas emissions.

Greenest of all....

The greenest city in the United States of America turned out to be a real surprise. It is a city that beckons. Read on....

Of all the cities in the world, it had to be......,,take a guess!

Aviation emissions, a sectoral approach.

The International Air Transport Association (IATA) had its environmental vision chalked out for a post-2012 scenario. It had set ambitious targets for the aviation industry by aiming to build a zero-emissions commercial aircraft within 50 years and capping aviation CO2 emissions starting 2020. The association expected to improve fuel efficiency of the industry by 1.5% per year from 2009 to 2020 and further reduce 50% of its emissions by 2050. Regional airline associations from around the world urged the member states of the International Civil Aviation organization (ICAO) to agree on a global framework for the industry and adopt a sectoral approach to mitigate its carbon emissions.

The industry sought to bring international aviation under a post-Kyoto framework that did not distort competition amongst airline companies. It sought help from the governments to fund its research in fuel standards, incentives to replace existing fleet with fuel efficient aircrafts and modernize air traffic management technologies. It considered many options including sustainability of biofuels as a substitute for aviation fuel since the use of biofuels (from sources such as algae, jatropha, camelina biomass) as ‘drop-in’ fuels, was tested successfully. These fuels, considered environmentally sound, did not require major adaptation of aircrafts and by blending biofuels with existing jet fuel, emissions were expected to reduced by an additional 5%.

The implementation of advanced systems in air traffic management (ATM) was targeted to provide 4% emission reductions by 2020. The working ATM systems include Single European Sky (SESAR), which was likely to produce a 70% cut in route extension, while the Next Generation Air Traffic Management system in the USA was expected to reduce delays to 57%.

Some of the other options included airport domain improvements for the purpose of annual fuel savings which was based on Performance-Based Navigation (PBN) and Continuous Descent Arrival (CDA. CDA is expected to save up to 630 kg of carbon dioxide per landing. In all, seamless global treatment of the aviation industry as one sector would ensure a huge reduction in its emissions. On a global basis, cutting flight times by one minute per flight expected to save 4.8 million tons of Carbon dioxide every year on a global basis. Boeing’s Tailored Arrival concept, that enables aircrafts to descend uninterrupted on low engine power at constrained air space, maximized fuel efficiency and minimized any environmental impact of aviation. This concept established a predictable continuous descent rather than fuel intensive step-down descent by integrating air and ground automation through digital datalink.

On an overview, all stakeholders including manufacturers, research centers, airport authorities and airline operators in the industry are to develop synergies to create a global system alongside technological improvements to achieve optimum results in reducing aviation emissions.




(With Inputs from www.euractive.com and www.iata.org)

Adoption of a different kind....

Endearing cubs and a concept to keep them near. For those who can afford, an effort worth the money. Watch this for the cubs...awesome!

Green buildings and greener jobs...

Construction industry alters the landscape of this planet making a serious impact on our environment and sustainability. The industry has a huge share in the economic, social and environmental responsibility in our fight against global warming. The increasing population and surging urbanization renders all construction and post-construction activities accountable for a third of world’s energy consumption. Sustainable development encompasses construction of durable green buildings which limit depletion of resources and mitigating the adverse effects of climate change on natural habitats and bio-diversity.


Prospering the Green way.

The science of construction extends to the assembly of building materials that promotes adaptability and minimizes transportation costs. Buildings that are either rebuilt or retrofitted to reduce energy consumption and pollution are referred to ‘green buildings’ in the technical sense of the term. These energy efficient buildings conserve space and natural resources, generate lesser amount of waste and can be rearranged to be used for diverse activities. The building plan modules for green buildings provide for either a photovoltaic, wind or solar power unit to generate electricity optimizing energy usage.

Retrofitting your homes with green roofing

Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) under the Protocol assists developing countries in sustainable development and meeting their quantified emission reduction commitments. ITC Hotel Sonar Bangla, Kolkata and Technopolis, Kolkata, two of the few green buildings in India, were refused registration as CDM projects despite paving way for sustainable development through energy efficiency, thereby reiterating the need for CDM reforms in a post-2012 framework.

A good corporate governance framework for the construction industry is a prerequisite to promote collaborative partnerships with communities, achieve sustainability and gain access to financial markets. It includes a company's business practices that reflect its social and environmental performances that are governed by the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and principles established by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). The United Nations Conference on Trade and Environment (UNCTAD) has drawn out the guidelines on eco-efficiency of such corporations involved in construction and allied works. Construction industry needs to adhere to global characteristics of corporate governance involving its consumers, clients, developers, investors, contractors and other players in the construction industry.

Rainwater conservation and harvesting

Recorded evidence of rainwater harvesting in India dates back to pre-Harappan and Harappan periods of civilizations that existed 6000 years ago and today we are seen reinventing the wheel, struggling to optimize usage of water resources and conserve rainwater. Archeological excavations in the Northern and Western India revealed rainwater harvesting structures, some of which were constructed during the Mughal era. These ancient structures of bunds, water channels and air shafts continue to serve the purpose till date and steps have been taken to augment and preserve them.

A standing example of such ancient systems can be seen at the Humayun's tomb, Delhi, where one finds water wells and water channels constructed around the main structure. UNESCO declared this monument a world heritage site, which was restored using private funds, a project that was completed in March 2003 under the aegis of the Archaeological Survey of India. It revitalized the existing water channels by desilting the wells at the site to recreate one of the largest rainwater harvesting systems in India.


The Water Channel: Resource on water management

In the year 2001, the State of Tamilnadu declared as mandatory the incorporation of rainwater harvesting system in all the construction and development plans submitted to the relevant statutory authority for sanction and approval. Successive governments did not fail in their efforts to implement this requirement without making it a political casualty.


Sand dam technique to harvest water in semi-arid countries

Coffee as a witness to Climate Change....

To the political question whether climate change is real or surreal, the inevitable answer that emerges is that "it as real as can be". Climate change is seen manifested in every activity that is aligned with agriculture and forestry, affecting even the coffee and tea drinking habits of those who reach out for their everyday dose of caffeine.



The decline in coffee harvests comes as a direct result of changing precipitation patterns, its timing, dry spells, pollution and increase in temperatures. Countries like Kenya, Uganda, Ethiopia, Brazil, Peru, Mexico, Nicaragua – that grow coffee and tea for the world market are reeling under a direct impact of climate change even as their exports dwindle. It is not just the quantity but the quality of the coffee beans that took a beating under climate change as coffee growers witnessed their annual incomes dwindling to about 90%.

Coffee has an upper temperature limit, beyond which the yields decline considerably while increase in temperatures have forced growers to seek higher altitudes. Coffee growers tend to diversify into other crops as they look to adaptation strategies and not just long-term mitigation to counter global warming. Some of the efforts include testing heat-resistant coffee varieties and planting shade trees alongside coffee plantations to reduce the temperatures for better yield.

Coffee drinkers need to shun coffee grown on cleared forests land and instead seek environmentally friendly coffee beans that are organic and shade-grown.

Brazil's Global Warming Agenda | World Resources Institute

Brazil's Global Warming Agenda | World Resources Institute


Brazil took the first step forward by setting a national agenda to meet its commitment on emissions reductions.

In the fight against climate change....

A Comprehensive database on climate change legislations

By 2050, 40% of the Amazon green cover might vanish if the current trend in deforestation and illegal forestry clearance continued. Land-use changes in the tropics account for about 17% of greenhouse gas emissions while clearance of forests leaves future mitigation targets difficult to achieve. Preserving the Amazon forests and other forest cover is vital to mitigate the deleterious effects of climate change.

Forests, the terrestrial carbon reservoirs, account for 77% of the carbon stored in vegetation, which is twice as much as carbon in the atmosphere. Forests are net source or ‘sink’ absorbing more carbon than they emit. Deforestation causes irreversible loss of biodiversity leading to release of half the stored carbon while destroying several indigenous forest cultures. Clearance of forests emits much more carbon than any fossil fuel power plant.

By creating biodiversity corridors to prevent illegal deforestation and indigenous species, Brazil came to be the forerunner in conserving forests and ecosystems. United States has taken steps to include international forest carbon in its cap-and-trade policy allowing capped entities to use international forest carbon allowances as offsets to their domestic emissions. International forest carbon activities and trading in international carbon offsets can lessen deforestation globally and play a critical role in the success of an international climate policy.

International forest carbon credits can be generated by extending support to forest reserves that protect threatened species, implementing sustainable forestry practices and revoking palm oil concessions issued in respect of those forests that are yet to be cleared. Global policy makers have proposed a financing mechanism to include incentives to reduce emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD) in future carbon agreements. REDD could generate funding from developed countries to reduce deforestation in developing countries.

Using sustainable palm oil

Projects related to deforestation do not find a place under Clean Development Mechanism, a flexibility instrument under Article 12 of the Kyoto Protocol which assists developing countries in achieving sustainable development and meeting their quantified emission reductions. The absence of deforestation projects is primarily due to concerns about leakage (increased emissions outside project boundaries), additionality (whether the emissions reduction is the outcome of the CDM project or business as usual reductions) and lack of standards in setting baseline methodologies.


Forest conservation requires substantial funding from developed countries to assist developing nations in adopting sustainable agricultural practices and providing alternate means of economic sustenance to those farmers displaced from forests. Steps to reduce deforestation include stabilizing international prices of commodities like soya, grown on grasslands, and specifying standards to certify that products like soya are not grown on newly cleared forests or on lands adjacent to forests. To sum up, avoided deforestation needs international funding and cheaper transfer of technologies to encourage sustainable agricultural and forestry practices. Finally, reforms to international climate policy backed by stringent domestic legislation are bound to help our fight against global warming.


Here is one reason to push those reforms

Watching a glacier....

An amazing video that can take your breath away.

A recent legislation...

As a continuum to the earlier post on black carbon, it is only pertinent that I highlight a recent legislation taken up by the United States.

The Black Carbon Emissions Reductions Act, 2009, curbs black carbon emissions which have a more potent effect on global warming than carbon dioxide. The legislation attempts at mitigating the climatic effects of black carbon emissions within the country as well as internationally.


Text of the bill can be viewed here.

The Act contemplates large scale implementation strategies extending financial and technical assistance to developing nations to help reduce, mitigate and abate black carbon emissions. The technical assistance includes interventions to improve fuel efficiency of vehicles that emit black carbon, mitigate combustion related air pollution and improve stove efficiency in developing nations within a period of 5 years.

This Bill uses adaptation strategies under managerial and infrastructure categories, implementable within a shorter time frame. Recent studies prove that by tackling black carbon emissions at the point of source, we may not only be protecting glaciers and ice sheets we may do well by limiting the rate of sea level rise eventually preserving perennial rivers.

What afflicts Himalayan Glaciers...

Black carbon, also known as ‘the third world soot’, is not far behind carbon dioxide in contributing to climate change. The study of its effect on global warming is relatively new and this explains its absence in the reports of IPCC. Black carbon is produced by incomplete combustion of fossil fuels and biomass fuels and by cooking stoves fueled by wood, twigs and other dung cakes as witnessed in many of the villages of Asian countries.

Soot is definitely contributing to the global warming, innocuously and unnoticed since its awareness remains limited. To those who have had the pleasure of walking along the fields in remote villages of India it comes as a familiar sight to see black grime covering mud houses. The role of black carbon on the vanishing glaciers has been neglected too long.

The soot, seen as deposits on snow, permafrost and ice, has the effect of reducing the `albedo’ (ability of an object to reflect sunlight back into the atmosphere) of objects and tends to absorb more heat in the process. Soot has a shorter atmospheric lifetime oscillating between several days to weeks.

India has taken steps to curb black carbon emissions from primitive form of cooking stoves by creating awareness among the villagers on the health benefits of using alternative form of cooking their daily meal.

Alternative fuels for cooking.


Renewable energy from solar and wind systems could cater to the fuel needs of villagers and possibly lead to usage of electric stoves in their homes. By what is known as the ‘Distributed Generation’, a term used to describe generation of power close to the point of use, it is possible to meet the energy needs of rural masses without much cost. A distributed generation potential typically ranges from 1 kilowatt to 5 Megawatts in capacity, having practical advantages in avoiding transmission and distribution costs. These advantages range from reducing the need to build new transmission lines and augmenting the ability to meet peak power demands.

The highlight of this form of energy generation is that these systems can be installed in small increments to meet the load requirements of the end user. Any excess energy generated by such systems can either be directed to the grid, increasing the efficiency of the grid, or stored in batteries or fuel cells for future consumption. Any investment in this area, through a partnership between private entities and communities, will reduce overall emissions creating a ripple effect by steadily increasing energy efficiency.

Dalai Lama for the cause of Tigers....

As a mark of respect to their leader, Dalai Lama, and in keeping with his stand on illegal wildlife trade some of the Tibetans have chosen to give up their lucrative business of trading in tiger skins and body parts. Will his intervention help these awesome creatures?

Tiger skins go up in smoke

Without a doubt, we are solely responsible for the diminishing numbers and extinction of some of their species. What was once considered the pride of India, is now seen struggling to survive and fighting to keep its rightful place on this planet.

Many, rightly so, attribute indiscriminate logging, urbanization and habitat encroachment among the many reasons for their recent plight. As in many other conservation issues, lack of political will to enforce anti-poaching and allied wildlife laws is a cause for the sad state of these animals. We need substantial investment in training, recruitment of diligent enforcement officials and sympathetic patrol guards who do not give in to greed abet the cause.