13/04/2020 - Environment

KEY POINTS

·         Clean air, unrestricted views of mountain ranges hidden for decades, and the return of thriving bird life in urban areas have been unexpected upsides of the lockdown, and they offer a more compelling case for climate change activists than any scientific model.

·         This unexpected environmental dividend offers a useful template for climate-change policies.

·         In terms of a domestic agenda, two elements suggest themselves. At the policy level, the priority must be enforcing the challenging 2020-30 targets India, a coal-fired economy, has set for itself under the Paris climate change accord.

·         This will involve urgently addressing long-standing anomalies in the solar power eco-system, the main renewable energy source. Most solar companies are in the red on account of the aggressive (some say unrealistic) price bids by new entrants at progressively lower levels, which discourages distribution companies from buying from existing producers.

·         Creating a carbon sink is a bigger challenge. The India State of Forest Report of 2019 suggested that the supposed increase in forest cover is misleading because the term includes plantations and masks a marked decline in the Northeast with its rich biodiversity.

·         Beyond the larger agenda are granular policies for the Centre and states to consider. Support to industry on revival could be linked to adopting pollution-free processes and recycling. It is fairly easy, for instance, to adopt waste-water recycling in modern industry.

·         It is vital that this initiative, which has yielded some positive responses, should not be reversed in a low oil-price regime (petrochemicals being the basic input for plastic.

·         Getting started on setting up e-vehicle infrastructure (charging stations and so on) would also go a long way toward encouraging more people to examine this mode of vehicle ownership.

The Central Pollution Control Board(CPCB) said that the lockdown imposed to combat Corona virus pandemic resulted in significant improvement of air quality across the country.Himachal Pradesh's Dhauladhar range became visible to the residents of Punjab's Jalandhar after around 30 years indicated the improvement of Air Quality Index.

Every Cloud has a silver lining :

Inspite of stringent environmental regulations,it was thought that the pollution levels across the country cannot be brought down to normal.But the lockdown imposed due to pandemic became a ray of hope that one should never feel hopeless because difficult times always lead to the better days.Policy makers were doing brain storming to meet the goals mentioned in Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change's special report on the impacts of global warming of 1.5 degree celsius,Sustainable Development goals,Nationally Determined Contributions as per Paris Agreement etc.The pandemic situation provided answers to many questions in the context of reduction of pollution levels albeit its a crisis.

MoEFC,Central Pollution Control Board and State Pollution Control Boards :

MoEFCC,CPCB,SPCBs need to take advantage of the situation to promote awareness among the people.They can formulate new strategies by observing the present situation like limited functioning of Industries,Odd-Even functioning in green zones,decrease in Ganga river pollution to complement/supplement the existing strategies.They should ensure that this air quality index should be carried forward even after easing the lockdown.

Government may neglect environment after the lockdown because Government mostly focuses on reviving the deteriorating economy.But it should give equal importance to the environment as well for securing sustainable future to its citizens.Also its a fundamental duty of citizens to protect the environment and they should keep it in mind and act accordingly for their welfare.

Please review.