Articles & Op-Eds

The year 2022 is important. It not only marks the 75th anniversary of India’s independence, but it also marks the 50 years of institutional environmentalism in India. Coincidently, a week after we celebrated 25 years of Independence, the Lok Sabha Sabhapassed the Wildlife (Protection) Bill, 1972, making it the fi [...]

Last month, India protested against its ranking on the Environmental Performance Index (EPI) of 2022, prepared by researchers at the Yale and Columbia Universities in the U.S. The report measures 40 performance indicators across 11 categories to measure the “state of sustainability around the world.” India was ranked last (180) [...]

Multi-use products, not the material they are made of, are the key The nationwide ban on single-use plastic products (SUPs) that started yesterday comes on the heels of a two-decade-long effort. The first attempt was made in 1999 with the ban on thin polythene bags. Since then, three national and [...]

GoI must support an independent benchmarking scheme to evaluate our environmental performance and track progress. Much debate has happened on the recently released Environmental Performance Index (EPI), in which India was ranked the worst country in the world. The Government of India (GoI) has rejected the ranking and called it [...]

New disasters can happen if countries decide to unilaterally try technological fixes to global Warming. With record-breaking heatwaves hitting many parts of the world over the last few months, scientific circles have been hotly debating whether countries should prepare to deploy geoengineering technologies to deal with such climate emergencies. Should [...]

Faith-based organisations can be strategic actors in supporting environmental action. The climate crisis demands collaboration between countries and communities We Indians love to speak about our religious and cultural heritage of protecting the environment. And, we do have a vast heritage to boast about. Our sacred texts are full …

There is no contradiction between increasing coal consumption in India and implementing a just transition in the coal districts and states. On March 28, 2022, an extremely important and unstarred question was asked by Priyanka Chaturvedi, member, Rajya Sabha, which was replied to by Pralhad Joshi, Union minister of coal. [...]

We have entered a new age of heat extremes. Concrete and glass-heavy urban buildings are a major hazard India is searing. Large parts of the country are in the grips of unbearable heat and heatwaves. March this year was the hottest March on record, and March-April has witnessed a record [...]

Another arms race will divert resources Another arms race will divert resources from poverty, pandemic and environment crisis. In response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Tesla CEO Elon Musk recently called on the US to increase its domestic oil and gas production to cut-off imports from Russia. While new oil [...]

The climate watcher has produced nothing for the general public, except for a press release and a set of headlines. Scientists are good at science but bad at communicating it to the masses. This is precisely why the gap between the scientific understanding of the climate crisis and policy responses [...]

How to read biennial forest surveys? The best way is decadal data produced by same methods India State of Forest Reports (ISFRs) are published every two years. And, every ISFR shows an increase in the forest cover compared to the previous one. ISFR 2021, released last week, too shows an [...]

Who’d have guessed that a 49.6°C temperature would be recorded somewhere in a normally frigid Canada? Now wildfires, caused by the extreme heat, have reduced its tiny town of Lytton to ash. To put things in perspective, the maximum temperature ever recorded in Delhi is 48°C. For decades, scientists have [...]