Climate Change Reader
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Climate change is dictating the fate of our planet. Record temperatures, melting ice sheets and glaciers, sea level rise, emergence of CLIMATE new diseases and the increasing frequency of extreme weather CHANGE events like cyclones, floods and droughts have become the new normal. Climate Change Reader READER for Universities breaks down FOR UNIVERSITIES the science, impacts, politics and sustainable pathways from Edited by Sunita Narain innumerable scientific studies and reports using infographics, case studies and lectures. This book has been specially written keeping in mind the UGC syllabus and will enable professors and students gain a deeper understanding of the most burning issue of our times. Science n Responsibility n Impacts n Global Negotiations n Carbon Budget n Down To Earth www.downtoearth.org.in Market Mechanisms n Published by: Centre for Science and Environment, 41, Tughlakabad Low Carbon Economy n Institutional Area, New Delhi 110 062; Phone: 91-11-4061 6000; Fax: 91-11-26085879; E-mail: [email protected]; Website: www.cseindia.org Response n 01Covers with spine (8mm).indd 3 27/02/19 1:26 PM DownToEarthBOOKS w w NOT IN MY BACKYARD With rapid urbanisation and the rise of a Solid waste management in Indian cities consumer culture, Indian cities are being swamped by a mammoth heap of waste. The nation produces 62 million tonnes of municipal solid waste every year. A major NOT IN MY BACKYARD overhaul in the legislative framework of the sector is taking place with the notifi cation of six new waste management rules (plastic, electronic, biomedical, construction and demolition, hazardous and other wastes, and solid waste). But legislation is just one aspect of management. How can India reduce the DownToEarth mountain of waste to a manageable molehill? This book tries to fi nd out. Centre for Science and Environment 41, Tughlakabad Institutional Area, New Delhi 110 062 Phones: 91-11-40616000 Fax: 91-11-29955879 E-mail: [email protected] Website: www.cseindia.org 00Cover.indd 2-3 20/04/16 10:06 AM STATE OF INDIA'S ENVIRONMENT 2019 FRAMES CHANGE A DownToEarth ANNUAL Heartening tales that define new India A DownToEarth ANNUAL of STATE OF A DownToEarth PUBLICATION INDIA’S STATE Frames of Change Cover.indd 13 16/11/18 12:36 PM ENVIRONMENT 2018 OF INDIA’S Sunita Narain Rakesh Kalshian Shreeshan Venketash Joe Hill YK Alagh Richard Mahapatra Akshit Sangomla Indira Khurana Sashshank Bhide Sachin Jain Kundan Pandey Bharat Lal Seth Devinder Sharma Avilash Roul Minaj Ranjita Singh Venkatesh Dutta Jean Dreze Srestha Banerjee Shikha Sharma Vivek Chattopadhya ENVIRONMENT Chandra Bhushan Swati Sambyal Madhoolika Ishan Kukreti DROUGHT 2019 DROUGHT BUT WHY? DROUGHT BUT WHY? With a foreword by Sunita Narain A DownToEarth PUBLICATION DownToEarth DownToEarth ENVIRONMENT LIFESTYLE DISEASES READER FOR UNIVERSITIES ANIL AGARWAL Ecosystems Population BODY Resources 1947-2002 Energy Climate Change ow, honeyhu BURDEN Conservation e cr nte STATE OF INDIA’S HEALTH Pollution Th r Environmental Movements he critical issue that we are dealing with here is not global warming, but how to India's most comprehensive and manage a global common property resource called the atmosphere. Behind all the contemporary book on environment, based on UGC syllabus, for professors and students global environmental problems that we have been talking about, there are global natural resources which are under threat. When we try to manage any resource, SUNITA NARAIN and the kitchen garden Why I Should be Tolerant is an it is important to understand how that resource is being managed, who are the parties environmentalist’s reflections, reactions SUNITA NARAIN T and arguments on contemporary issues related to the environment and development. The writings make the critical connection bioscope responsible for its destruction, and what are the stakes for humanity in that resource. Part between local and global developments of and between the developments of the 20th Piu & Pom century, and how they continue to impact us in the 21st century. The writings stem from by of the problem is that the perception of many of these global environmental problems are the author’s own experience in forests, farms and factories, besides the numerous debates she has been part of during her 30 years in driven by scientists who understand little about management or about property rights. public life. Every piece of writing featured here represents various threads of public discourse that have haunted the world on its relationship with nature. They focus on technical solutions and insist that those technical solutions be adopted by On environment and environmentalism in Down To Earth Down To the 21st century A STATE OF everybody. Social scientists have paid very little attention, particularly in the developing DownToEarth Down To Earth FORTNIGHTLY ON POLITICS OF DEVELOPMENT, INDIA’S ENVIRONMENT AND HEALTH, SINCE 1992 ANNUAL ENVIRONMENT world, to the management of global environmental resources. 2017 SN Reader Cover_final.indd 1 25/05/16 2:38 PM What is being negotiated (in climate forums), therefore, is not how much future STATE OF INDIA'S ENVIRONMENT 2016 emissions should be cut but how we manage the atmosphere and who owns the atmosphere. If the atmosphere is owned by every human being on Earth, then it is now very clear that A DownToEarth ANNUAL a few people are using this resource as a free access property and destroying it at the SOE cover.indd All Pages 22/11/16 1:20 PM expense of others. Clearly, therefore, a good entitlements regime is necessary to establish everybody’s rights in this common heritage of humankind. To buy: www.downtoearth.org.in/books Founder-Director, Mail your order to us along with a Cheque for the required amount, drawn in favour of `Society for Environmental Communications' addressed to: Society for Environmental Communications, Centre for Science and Environment, New Delhi 41, Tughlakabad Institutional Area, New Delhi - 110062. Please write to Ramachandran if you have any queries at - [email protected] 01Covers with spine (8mm).indd 4 27/02/19 1:27 PM CLIMATE CHANGE READER FOR UNIVERSITIES Edited by Sunita Narain Down To Earth 3-9.indd 3 27/02/19 1:29 PM Down To Earth www.downtoearth.org.in CONTENTS EDITOR: Sunita Narain FOREWORD CO-EDITORS: Richard Mahapatra, S S Jeevan 06 Why this Reader by Sunita Narain MAPS AND INFOGRAPHICS: Raj Kumar Singh RESEARCH SUPPORT: Kiran Pandey CHAPTER 01 DESIGN: Ajit Bajaj, Sanjit Kumar ILLUSTRATIONS: Tarique Aziz 10 SUMMARY PRODUCTION: Rakesh Shrivastava, Gundhar Das What is climate change? ISBN: 978-81-86906-35-4 14 CASE STUDY #1 PRICE: R290/- (US $20) The unprecedented dust storms © 2018 Centre for Science and Environment in India in May 2018 CENTRE FOR SCIENCE AND ENVIRONMENT is a public 16 LECTURE #1 interest research and advocacy organisation, which Andrew King, Ben Henley and Ed Hawkins promotes environmentally-sound and equitable on what is a pre-industrial climate and why development strategies. The Centre's work over the does it matter? past 38 years has led it to believe and argue, both nationally and internationally, that participation, 18 TERMS, TASKS and FURTHER READING equity and community-based natural resource management systems alone will lead the world CHAPTER 02 towards durable peace and development. 21 SUMMARY What is climate science? DOWN TO EARTH is a science and environment fortnightly published by the Society for Environmental 28 CASE STUDY #2 Communications. Founded in May 1992, the magazine Why I mourn Dussehra has become a reading habit in nearly all districts of the country. In the words of Down To Earth's founder 30 LECTURE #2 editor Anil Agarwal, the magazine reports all those Sunita Narain on the wake-up call things that a regular magazine or newspaper reports: finance, economics, politics, markets, diplomacy, 33 TERMS, TASKS and FURTHER READING conflicts, development. But we look at all this with CHAPTER 03 two eyes, the eyes of science and of environment. 35 SUMMARY ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS: We thank all the reporters and Who is responsible? researchers of Down To Earth and the Centre for Science and CASE STUDY #3 Environment, whose research have been used in this book. 40 Inconvenient truth, retold We are grateful to Bread for the World and Oracle for their 42 LECTURE #3 support for this publication. Chandra Bhushan on consumption and emissions Published by Centre for Science and Environment, 45 TERMS, TASKS and FURTHER READING 41, Tughlakabad Institutional Area, New Delhi 110 062 Phones: 91-11-4061 6000, Fax: 91-11-26085879 E-mail: [email protected], Website: www.cseindia.org Printed at Multi Colour Services, New Delhi COVER PHOTOGRAPH: Gettyimages 4 CLIMATE CHANGE READER FOR UNIVERSITIES 3-9.indd 4 27/02/19 1:29 PM CHAPTER 07 91 SUMMARY Can markets help? 100 CASE STUDY #7 The East Khasi Hills project 102 LECTURE #7 Jutta Kill on emission offsets 104 TERMS, TASKS and FURTHER READING CHAPTER 08 105 SUMMARY Is low carbon economy possible? CHAPTER 04 114 CASE STUDY #8 47 SUMMARY Temporary “remedial measures” What are the impacts? 116 LECTURE #8 61 CASE STUDY #4 Rakesh Kalshian on the In search of grass technological dilemmas 62 LECTURE #4 118 TERMS, TASKS and FURTHER READING Purnamita Dasgupta on poverty in the Himalayas CHAPTER 09 65 TERMS, TASKS and FURTHER READING 119 SUMMARY What are we doing about it? CHAPTER 05 125 CASE STUDY #9 67 SUMMARY Analyses of missions under India’s What is climate politics? National Action Plan on Climate Change 76 CASE STUDY #5 126 LECTURE #9 The intolerance to listen Vijeta Rattani on why State Action Plans on Climate Change are flawed 78 LECTURE #5 Madhuparna Banerjee on loss and damage 129 TERMS, TASKS and FURTHER READING 81 TERMS, TASKS and FURTHER READING CHAPTER 06 83 SUMMARY Carbon budget: Exhausted? 87 CASE STUDY #6 Warming up to catastrophe 88 LECTURE #6 Sunita Narain on the wolf at our door 90 TERMS, TASKS and FURTHER READING CLIMATE CHANGE READER FOR UNIVERSITIES 5 3-9.indd 5 27/02/19 1:29 PM FOREWORD WHY THIS READER ven a few decades ago, I would not have imagined that climate change would be a study subject for graduate and post-graduate students.