Even with civil nuclear deals and rapid work on alternative energy solutions such as solar and wind, the bulk of India's power needs over the next decade will come from coal-fired thermal power plants. And regardless of the spin that is given, coal power is not ‘green'
Sometimes a story is best told in the first person perspective, so bear with your writer here. On Deepawali night, I was returning to Delhi on a long-haul flight. Coming in over from the far-east ensures that you have a flightpath that pretty much precisely tracks the Ganga from Bengal to Agra, thus ensuring a flightpath over Patna, Varanasi, Allahabad and Kanpur. You can make out the the sparkling lights of firecrackers even from 38,000 feet above. While it is pretty difficult to capture such a sight on camera, it is a rather pleasing spectacle.
It is only when you begin to approach Delhi that you notice that these beautiful sparkling lights and firecrackers have consequences. At about 3,000 feet, according to the plane’s information system, you pass through this layer of grey cloud. A grey cloud that looks like an orange glow thanks to the bright lights of the city below. This grey cloud is a perpetual feature of the city of Delhi, a feature that anyone flying in or out of the city experiences almost always. If only it were a simple weather phenomenon and not a mixture of noxious gases and particles.
That said, the amount of firecrackers burst this Deepawali seemed lower than usual, with school-children warned away from the hazards of firecrackers and a general sense among the population at large that air pollution is quickly becoming a major problem. The data was mixed about how much worse this Deepawali pollution was over the previous year’s pollution, but there was little doubt that the pollution, better or worse, was still quite noxious.
A few days later, a friend, who, like me, was also a long-time resident of the city, asked me a fairly pertinent question, “How do you plan to keep living in Delhi in 10 years’ timeIJ” Frankly, I could not give him an honest answer, as I stood on his balcony.
From his rooftop, the bright lights of Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium were lit up for a football match, and the lights threw up a grey, almost soupy air. Forget the stars, visibility was barely a few kilometres at best. There remains no doubt that air pollution is becoming a major concern in Delhi. There is also little doubt that the pollution levels in Delhi are so bad now that they are already leading to premature deaths, even if those are yet to be quantified.
But here lies the rub. Air pollution is bad, but it is only going to get worse in India. The Government of that day will have to walk a fine line on this matter. The other major thing that you notice while flying over eastern and northern India at night are the massive patches of dark spots, something evident even in the false-colour satellite image of India released by the United States space agency Nasa and passed off as ‘India on Diwali’ by well-meaning celebrities.
The fact is that a large swathe of India still has little or no access to reliable electricity. This swathe of India houses close to a quarter of the population of the country. The fact is that the State of Delhi has a considerably higher peak demand for electricity than the entire State of Bihar. The same is true for all States across northern India.
One of the promises of the Narendra Modi Government is to make electricity available to thousands of villages over the next three years. And, apparently, this is not some hollow promise of keeping one streetlight on for a few hours every evening but to have reliable and affordable electricity in almost every home in these currently unconnected villages. This will be a great feat and achievement by the Government. India is still a power-hungry country and having electricity available across villages could well lead to massive economic and social empowerment and add a few percentage points to India’s GDP growth.
But even with civil nuclear deals and rapid work on alternative energy solutions such as solar and wind as well as rapid installation of low-energy devices that use light-Emitting Diode technology, the bulk of India’s power needs over the next decade will come from coal-fired thermal power plants. And coal power, no matter how nicely the sector puts it, is not a ‘green’ source of energy.
However, coal-fired power plants can be established rapidly; indeed, there are several coal-fired power plants ready and waiting to go onstream as India resolves its coal acquisition issues. And the fact is that India does have the world’s third largest reserves of coal, and to not utilise this vital resource would be almost criminal.
In comparison, India will need to depend on foreign sources for uranium yellowcake for nuclear plants. And nuclear power plants are fraught with controversy and take several years and huge amount of capital expenditure to build. While solar energy has been spoken of as a solution, the technology around solar power is still maturing. While costs are rapidly declining, a huge capital expenditure is also required to establish solar plants. Yet, given the poor air quality and the problems posed by pollution as well as rising sea-levels, India will need to be on the vanguard of futuristic energy solutions, even with those involving coal.
To argue that India should not go down the same development path as other countries have done, could even be seen as a racist narrative. If India is to develop, Indians need access to electricity, and giving Indians fair and equitable access to electricity can provide impetus to social mobility and power societal change in India. This columnist has argued in the past that the mobile phone has been greatest tool against Indian patriarchy, similarly providing electricity to India’s poorest and most socially inequitable regions can well be a tool against the caste system.
Unfortunately, India will be painted as a demon by the Western media for not giving up coal, because India cannot give up coal tomorrow or even the day after tomorrow — the same Western media that spares no efforts in criticising India for the caste system. India is embracing new technologies, and will need to embrace more new technologies, but a fine line has to be walked. How can India develop without polluting the lungs of her citizensIJ And is development worth it if everyone is going to fall ill anywayIJ
The positions that Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Minister for Environment and Forests Prakash Javadekar take in the Paris summit at the end of this month will be very interesting indeed.