Guest Post for Aguanomics

Check out my guest post for David Zetland's Aguanomics blog. It's co-authored by me and my friend, Erik.

"Over the past two months, we have had the fortune of researching an innovative and highly participatory project in one of our graduate courses at the School of Community and Regional Planning. Both of us had an interest in exploring groundwater in the developing world and were fortunate to stumble across an article in the Economist magazine entitled “Making Farmers Matter” with a focus on India. Why India you may ask? India is the world’s largest user of groundwater with an estimated 22 million wells. As Steven Solomon writes in his newest book, “in India's breadbaskets of Punjab and Haryana, the water tables are falling over three feet per year; monitored wells in the western state of Gujarat show a fall in the water table from 50 feet to over 1,300 feet in thirty years”. India accounts for 25% of the world’s total groundwater draw. Interested in more statistics?"

Read the whole post here.

Groundwater challenges in Punjab, India

I delivered a presentation today in one of my classes called "Planning for Water Resource Management". My groupmate and I specifically discussed a participatory groundwater management project in the state of Andhra Pradesh located in South-Eastern India. I'll post a summary of our topic along with our presentation shortly. The video below discusses the contemporary challenges around groundwater overuse in the state of Punjab, India.

Farmers in Punjab are pumping groundwater beyond levels that are sustainable levels for their economic livelihood and for posterity. Farmers pump groundwater at profligate rates because they receive very generous water and electricity subsidies from the government. These subsidies do not give the farmers the proper signals of the value and true cost of these goods. While Punjab faces such challenges, states like Haryana, Rajasthan and Gujarat have also seen water tables drop due to excessive overpumping.

Our case study of Andhra Pradesh offers a contrast to the aforementioned through the utilization of a number of participatory methods that have engaged farmers to better understand the science of groundwater dynamics and strives toward behavioural change through groundwater conservation. More to come on this. In the meantime, please see the video below and understand that India's water challenges have several implications for the world including the international food market.



For more, see here.

India's infrastructure challenges

A recent article from the NY Times titled "A High-tech Titan Plagued by Potholes" discusses India's dire need of civil engineers to fulfill its long-term infrastructure goals. Software engineering and IT have taken off in India - they are far more profitable industries (better salaries) than civil or structural engineering.

"Young Indians’ preference for software over steel and concrete poses an economic conundrum for India. Its much-envied information technology industry generates tens of thousands of relatively well-paying jobs every year. But that lure also continues the exodus of people qualified to build the infrastructure it desperately needs to improve living conditions for the rest of its one billion people — and to bolster the sort of industries that require good highways and railroads more than high-speed Internet links to the West."

Both China and India are world's fastest growing economies. China however, unlike India, is rapidly advancing its infrastructure projects; high speed rail, hydro-electric dams, wastewater treatment plants etc. India has a long way to go especially in terms of bringing about infrastructure (like public transportation) that could boost its tourism industry and help improve living conditions for the country's poorest.

Along with the desire for civil engineering, urban planning will also be critical for India in the coming decades. From an environmental perspective, infrastructure improvements -- like those being done in China -- will bring about numerous environmental benefits including improved health and sanitation, a reduction in national carbon emissions and an improvement in air pollution in the urban areas.

What should India do? Any thoughts?

The return of cheetahs to India

Image: Quantum-Conservation.org

We don’t blog about wildlife too often, but I was intrigued by a recent article in The Guardian that reported the precipitous return of cheetahs to India. Indeed, the cheetah is to return to India more than 60 years after hunters shot the last three on the subcontinent.

Sites are currently being picked for the reintroduction of the animal. Eight cheetahs are being brought into India from countries including Iran, Namibia and South Africa. The budget for the reintroduction project is around £500,000 ($816,000 Canadian). Cheetahs will help restore the grasslands of the country and put pressure on state governments to enforce wildlife protection to ensure the animal's sustainability.

Wildlife, specifically tigers, have been adversely affected by poor wildlife protection policies across India. Conflicts between poor local communities and tigers, corruption and smuggling tiger parts to east Asia are only some of the reasons why the tiger population has shrunk drastically. India's population growth has also put immense pressure and stress on the tigers effectively encroaching on their territory. In fact, the tiger population shrunk from 3,600 in 2002 to 1,400 in 2010.

There is widespread enthusiasm for the return of the cheetahs; however, experts have noted that the herds of deer and antelopes --that once provided the cheetah’s diet-- are long gone. Thus, they think such a reintroduction –while a matter of national importance—is futile and bound to fail given the harsh conditions. Nonetheless, this decision, led by Indian Minister for the Environment, Jairam Ramesh, is critical because the cheetah is the only animal to have become extinct and such reintroduction signifies a renewed commitment to wildlife preservation.

The three reintroduction sites are the Kuno-Palpur Wildlife Sanctuary and Nauradehi Wildlife Sanctuary, in the central state of Madhya Pradesh, and Shahgarh in the desert near Jaisalmer, Rajasthan. "All three sites will aim to sustain a population of more than 100 cheetahs and create a tourist business" that will benefit local communities among other things.

Key message: India’s commitment to wildlife protection has thus far been less than impressive. While it is easy to criticize the reintroduction of the once extinct cheetah, I commend the country on its renewed interest to this very important matter. I hope that tigers will also receive more respect and be provided with more space, unmolested by human stresses.

A cleaner, cheaper, more useful type of clean coal...

Imagine if all you needed to resurface your driveway was a little sea water and some carbon dioxide? And what if I told you that by resurfacing your driveway you would be taking advantage of carbon free energy and even creating some relatively clean water?

Bollocks, you'd probably say (and I would hope in an English accent). Well, there's a company in the United States that is hoping to prove you wrong. Based off the naturally occurring process corals use to make their bones, some very innovative entrepreneurs at Calera have developed a method to take carbon emissions from gas and coal-fired plants and mixing it with ocean water to create calcium carbonate. Calcium carbonate -- the substance making up coral bones -- can be turned into cement or used as aggregate in construction projects.

There are plenty of small innovative firms out there with cool ideas like this, but Calera could very well make a significant impact. It has already attracted attention from Thomas Friedman, author of The World is Flat and columnist for the New York Times, and more importantly, significant investment from a major engineering firm confident enough to build several Calera plants.

There are hopes that this process will actually lead to a "clean coal" future, something that is heavily criticized by many because of the extraordinary expense and excruciatingly slow development of mainstream carbon capture and storage (CCS) technologies. By capturing the carbon emissions from coal and gas plants, it essentially makes them carbon emissions-free. Moreover, the carbon is stored in useful products like cement, as opposed to being pumped in large quantities underground.

A wonderful bonus that comes out of this process is relatively clean water. The salt water used loses about 80% of the properties that make it unsafe to drink, which happens to make it much easier to convert to fresh water using desalination as less energy is required to filter the water.

Considering how much coal is being used to power the world's electricity systems, this process, if actually scalable in an economic fashion, could change the whole playing field. The company is touting the potential of this technology in China and India, which are developing coal plants at a rate of nearly one a day. And since major construction projects and fresh water crises are bound to define much of each country's upcoming future, the technology is especially attractive.

But even if all the potential of this technology does come to fruition, it won't be perfect. Coal is a finite resource. Coal plants, even without carbon emissions, still have significant impacts on our lives. They emit dangerously high levels of toxic chemicals into the air -- even with scrubber technologies -- causing severe health complications. And coal mining is among the most environmentally devastating processes known to our history. I mean, how many other industries can say that they blow the tops off mountains to get what they want?

The trouble is, coal is going to be used excessively whether we like it or not.

No energy technology is perfect, but the Calera technology could at least make a significant dent as we try to lower carbon emissions. It's amazing what we can learn from nature. One hopes we don't kill too much of it off as we do.    

Could a Congestion Charge Zone work in Mumbai?

A number of months ago I blogged about London’s Congestion Charge Zone (CCZ) which charges motorists 8 pounds when they enter the city's designated zone from 7am in the morning to 6pm in the evening. It has been heavily praised and vigorously condemned from citizens all over the city. Despite its contestation and political controversy, it has increased public transit ridership and has led to an overall decrease in traffic congestion in the city along with a reduction in carbon dioxide emissions.

The CCZ scheme is effective in London as the statistics clearly demonstrate. Could such a system work in Mumbai, India? Its population is about 13.9 million not to mention a population density of 21,000 people per square kilometer. Automobiles are ubiquitous. They are inexpensive and everyone has one. If Mumbai brings about a CCZ the state (not city) would charge residents a cost (to be determined). This is one solution however, the city is also looking at other options. For instance, it may build a metro system connecting the densely populated suburbs of east and west Mumbai. It may implement a Bus Rapid transit system similar to the one in Curitiba, Brazil. They are also exploring air conditioned train coaches.

Mumbai appears to have many options. The IT company Mastek, who was principally responsible for putting London’s CCZ into practice, is being turned to for solutions. The CCZ has proven to work in the massive metropolis of London but implementing such a system in Mumbai could face tremendous social and economic opposition. Public transit infrastructure desperately needs revitalization. Many of the city’s residents simply drive because cars are cheap, more convenient and more dependable than the eroding and dilapidated transit services.

The city has a documented propensity to spend a lot of capital on city infrastructure. The only problem is that this time around the capital is non-existent, and hence public transit has no money. The key point is that reducing aggregate emissions from vehicles will only take place with a good public transit system. An adequate transit system would have unambiguous advantages, the risk however is that the residents may not even use it- frustrated about how they are being taxed and they could even condemn it stating that driving is cheaper than taking the transit.

Key message: A CCZ in Mumbai would undoubtedly raise the necessary capital to expend on public transit revitalization. It would also help with Mumbai’s pollution challenges. But it may be economically burdensome on the city’s residents who are highly dependent on using the roads.

National park debate…

There are 1400 tigers presently in India. The country has 28 tiger reserves and 8 more are being added within the next 10 years. India’s population already at 1.1 billion, is going to probably surpass China’s 1.3 billion in the near future. We cannot forget that India's population rose by 21.34 % between 1991-2001. With 1400 tigers left in the country and with population pressures mounting one has to ask… is there a future for tigers in India?

Or....."What price should India pay to save its rapidly diminishing forests, and for whom, a trophy animal like the tiger, or its original inhabitants?" This is proving to be a difficult question to answer. Nagarhole National Park located in the southern state of Karnataka is facing a big conundrum over their tiger population. You can read the article here, but the main point is that the park has both a small tiger population and original tribal people living there. There are 1000 families living in close proximity to the tigers and other wildlife, this is problematic because it poses numerous threats to them. Some of the preservationists and government officials are worried about having the human population there because of the destruction of the tiger habitat, forest fires, logging, wood collection, and modern development etc.

The government is now relocating people outside of the park because they want the tiger population to be free from anthropogenic pressures. Ecologists are in support of this action claiming that nature comes back dramatically once you remove the pressure and stress, it is naturally resilient. Moreover, tigers are a species that reproduce in great numbers but cannot do so under great pressure. What is contentious here is that the government included in the land rights law a measure that allowed for the expulsion of settlements from areas deemed critical wildlife habitats, but with explicit consent of villagers. It is always challenging to receive consent from the villagers because some are in favour but the vast majority are in opposition to the proposal. About 1/3 of the 1,000 families who live inside the park have moved out.

What should we think about? According the article, compensation for these people is insufficient. Monetary benefits do not always solve the problem, these people have a close and intimate connection with the land and live off of it. Essentially, such an approach removes them from their natural capital. India`s economy is now booming with 9 percent economic growth, does it even enough have room for these tigers? This is a problem faced in places like Botswana as well. In Botswana, parks and game reserves are developed with an ostensible justification to protect species and wildlife.

As I learned from a talk last week delivered by a Botswanan scholar, diamonds are usually located in these parks and are difficult to get to with a human population living around them, the solution: move the people out. The hidden message here is that governments use this justification to evade the political controversy that accompanies natural resource extraction in parks. In other words, saying they are going to protect species when really they are developing parks and zoning areas for the purposes of getting to the natural resources.

Key message: Lots to think about here but in relation to India, is the government going to continue creating tiger reserves? The human population is expanding rapidly and this will indirectly affect the tiger population. It seems like a win-win situation for the government. They can create and preserve parks through relocating the Tribal population (who receive little benefits from the state) and protect tigers while concomitantly exploring natural resources. Because the people have been relocated, they cannot contest and oppose these actions because they are no longer living there. Always think critically about national park development not only in developing countries, but in developed countries like Canada.