The Hindu Business Line : India can lead on green energy

India has plentiful wind, sun, rainfall and talent, while it is poor in hydrocarbons. Rich in resources that can fuel a clean future, why should it not take leadership in green energy?

CARL POPE, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, SIERRA CLUB

Rasheeda Bhagat

It’s an interesting thought and great to hear: that India can become the world leader in developing green energy technologies suitable for villages. “It’s possible; you just have to say: ‘We understand that we are not a country very rich in oil or even coal.’ You have enough coal to make a big mess but not enough to light up the country!” You can’t take offence at these words of Carl Pope, executive director of Sierra Club, an infl uential grassroots environmental organisation in the US, because he is a passionate votary for India, particularly when comparing his experiences in China and India.

He actually lived in a Bihar (now Jharkhand) village for two years (1967-69) while with the Peace Corps, after graduating from Harvard and worked in health and family planning and can “still sing the jingle bus do ya teen bachche, hote hai ghar mein acchey” . His other India connection is his wife, who is from Mumbai.

The Sierra Club, he says, started looking at China and India in 2006. “In China, for the first six months, everything went really fast. The government rolled out the red carpet, we got a dinner with the Ambassador in Washington, they blessed us, said we love your kind of civil society which collaborates with, and not confronts, the government.”

But after that, every time they proposed a model of what they planned in China, “somebody doing something similar would get arrested. So we said the government might think it is open to our kind of civil society but it actually isn’t. It has not learnt to listen.” The Club suspended its activities “because we just kept having meetings but could never make a contribution.”

In India, on the other hand, things moved very slowly. “People said: ‘Well, we don’t know… you’ll have to persuade us’.” Though a different approach, it gave hope; talks were held simultaneously with government, business houses and civil society, the last being the “hardest to convince”.

The Sierra Club has a grassroots base of 1.3 million supporters, of which 750,000 are paying members who generate two-thirds of the budget of $80 million ($90 million two years ago). With the presence of many NRIs in the organisation, it was decided to recognise with a prize the “very good grassroots environmental work already going on in India.” Hence was created the “green livelihoods prize”. The first prizes were given in August 2009 to Ecosphere Spiti in Himachal Pradesh and Barefoot College in Rajasthan.

Fund networking

It has also decided to support SEWA, with its mammoth network of members, to create a green livelihoods programme. “With SEWA there is an enormous capacity of turning ideas into jobs, but they don’t have access to clean energy research money. It has not done what Barefoot College has done — training women to do their own solar installations. So we can help SEWA partner with Barefoot Doctors. They already have quite a large financial base; so, more than funds, we will bring in ideas and networking, as our focus is to create ‘clean energy’ jobs.”

Pope says Sierra Club has seen in India the phenomenal work on the ground – some by the government and some by businesses. For example, a PWD engineer in Coimbatore found out that if they put “chopped up polythene bags, the curse of the countryside, into the tar that goes into roads, the roads last longer. So now Coimbatore district has a programme where school children collecting a certain number of poly bags get a fee waiver. These are then chopped up and used on roads, thus creating jobs for women who do the chopping. At the same time you get rid of polythene bags and can keep the area clean.”

He adds that last year an Indian minister had admitted to him that if oil prices had remained at the highs of 2008, it would have been near impossible for the government to maintain subsidies on diesel and kerosene. “Yes, I know that this is an election issue, but clean energy will get top priority if it makes economic sense” says Pope.

If villages currently using kerosene for lighting could be given electricity, kerosene demand would fall. “India is a country rich in wind, sun, land, rainfall and talent and very poor in hydro carbons. So, why should a country rich in natural resources that can fuel a clean energy future not decide to take the leadership in this area? The Chinese have decided this is the future and are investing in it. But they are much less well endowed than India to do this.”

Contrary to China, where the top-down approach is adopted, in India it is the bottom-up or NGO approach that succeeds. And, yes, businesses will come in where there are profits, he admits, giving the example of the Pune region, where a few villages are being powered by solar energy.

“Representatives of a solar energy company gave every home a small roof-top solar panel, a little battery and two lights which last for 8 hours, giving them light at night.” Also, a bigger solar panel and a TV set have been provided for the village. “I said you are giving things away so where is the business here? And he said in these very poor villages kerosene for lighting consumes a third of their cash income. This necessity has now been eliminated as they will be using solar cells. Soon they’ll want more than two lights. They were basically creating customers by freeing up income,” says Pope.

“There are crores of families in India spending Rs 15 a day on kerosene for lighting. But if we set up the right financing models, as SELCO is doing in Karnataka, these same families can purchase a small solar system, which is much better and cleaner, for Rs 10 a day. This is being done – but not yet at scale.”

Centre for green livelihoods

Such isolated examples need replication and that can be done only via networking, for which NGOs and bureaucrats don’t have allocations. “So we’re creating collaborative space by funding and hosting training sessions, conferences, Web sites, etc., through the Centre for Green Livelihoods being set up in Mumbai. But it will be more a virtual than a physical centre.” He has also discussed with Biocon’s Kiran Mazumdar the challenges of climate change and she suggested that some of the research money being put into clean energy by the US should be channelled into joint Indo-American projects based in India.

This research venture will look into the efficiency of solar cells, solar cell technology and its cost, as also energy storage. “Because, if you can make batteries or something that can store solar or wind energy — India has plenty of both — then you can electrify villages without the expenses of a grid.”

Recession and environment

Asked if the recession had been a blessing in some way for the environment as American consumers had been forced to cut down consumption and, along with it, harmful emissions, he says: “Americans have been on a consumption binge that was completely absurd. That may not come back and that would be a good thing.” It might also improve saving habits in the US, he hopes. “My parents grew up in the Depression; their generation saw hard times and they saved. But then we had a generation that did not see hard times and did not save.”

So, long-term benefits would accrue. But, looking at the short term: “We were on the verge, in the US, of seeing very large quantities of private capital move into clean energy. But the recession has disrupted that and made it harder for the US to recognise the obligation we have to the rest of the world with regard to climate change.”

He adds that between 1970 and 2000, the US was the environment pace-setter of the world, “but from 2000-2005 we went down and Europe became the environment pace-setter. “But two years ago we said now either India or China has to take that role because, if they don’t set the pace, it is not going to happen. So, we began to explore whether we could make a contribution in either of these countries.”

The last word should go to Sierra Club’s work in Mexico, where there is a lot more corruption in this area than in India. “Actually it’s a cross between India and China, because, like India, it is sort of disorganised and, like China, it is quite repressive. The biggest work in Mexico is to get our allies out of jail, and sometimes they even get killed!”

(Response may be sent to rasheeda@thehindu.co.in)

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