I was washing my hands full of mud after settling a life in
a pot in my small little garden, which brings me to the biggest conundrum when
it comes to saving the environment. Once
you are done with your deed and you wash your hands, how do you wipe them dry?
With a disposable paper towel? It is most effective and convenient , especially
if it is made of recycled paper. But perhaps an entire forest was razed to make
all that paper. A fancy hotel places a tray full of cloth towels. Which seems
eco friendly. Use, wash and Re-use. But can you imagine the amount of cloth
towels that get to put away for a wash after a single wipe within 24 hours in
such place? And you think the energy consumed in getting them laundered
involves butterflies and dew drops?
The only method that involves no deforestation and no
landfills is a blow dryer. Most give out a gentle whiff of air that’s only good
at drying out your last molecule of patience. But there effective ones that dry
your hands real quick. The power for these powerful dryers doesn’t come from
that tiny solar panel placed on the roof many years ago on World Environment
Day. It comes from smoke spewing power stations. Speaking of smoke spewing,
India is aiming for all electric car fleet by 2030, which means petrol and diesel
would be tanked. Not because fossil fuels will end. But because of “conscious
decision” by Ministry of Power and Renewable energy to eliminate everything
that will make our air, water and planets dirtier.
In the good old days, when naturally aspirated engines used
to work on streets, which were until about April 2014, there was only one thing
that annoyed me. The look on people’s faces when I used to fish out my five
year old dumbphone. I loved my dumbphone. It had GPS navigation with simple
browser, I could browse, access multiple email accounts, send and receive
emails with attachments. More importantly, it had two-three day battery life.
Besides it used to fit in pockets, nooks and crannies. But then, Google stopped
support for Gmail on Java based phones- dumbphones for you and me.
Thanks to planned obsolescence, I finally gave into a
smartphone. It had 1 Gigs of RAM and 8 Gigs of memory. But before I get to know
its full features the device was already outdated. If I had to replace any part
it either cost me the price of new phone or it wasn’t available because my
phone is too ancient.
Which is when it struck me. Motown isn’t the best of health.
But Silicon valley is thriving. A car, if maintained well, lasts ten years. A
flagship smartphone lasts three years before you start complaining about lack
of storage, lack of battery and how apps don’t open as fast as they used to.
Sure a car is several times more expensive than a phone. But
when you buy a communication device, whether for 10k or 80k, it’s ridiculous
that it can’t provide three years of hassle free service. This, when cars in
the developed world, with infrastructure that’s easier on wear and tear, can
clock in seven figures on their odo and keep running. It may seem cars will
continue being that- work horses that keep running if you provide fuel and
service.
But I am not so sure. You see Silicon Valley is already at
the forefront of the automobile revolution that’s taking place as you are
reading this. Fully electric cars, driverless cars, cars which communicate with
other cars. We have gone much beyond electric cars now. But electric cars have
the same problems as phones. Battery packs. They take time to charge and over
months their ability to hold a charge diminishes. Cars are going to be about
software. If your manufacturer or a Google abandons operating system and
security updates for the connected cars older than a couple of years, you
wouldn’t be as eager to look up new cars on Amazon.
The automobile is polluting, crude slow and relies on
century old tech. Agreed. But the automobile is the only consumer durable
product, that’s hardy; tough can take beating and last a decade and never
become obsolete unless you drive it off a cliff. You see the problem with our
lot is we always take the pitchforks and sickles to the evil that’s in front of
our eyes. But are blissfully ignorant of the evils we don’t see.
The super sleek, super light smartphone on which you might
be reading, emits 2,25,000g of carbon in its manufacturing process. That’s as
much as a Porche 911 emits over 1000km. And this is obviously not your first
laptop or smartphone. Do consider what happens to the gadgets we discard. And
what can possibly happen when these cars turn into mere electric gadgets! The
electric cars we would see may not pollute, but the contribution to environment
in the manufacturing, maintenance and disposal won’t be much clearer than the point which I am trying to make.
A study by the Central Pollution control Board and the
National Environmental Engineering Research Institute reveals that the
percentage contribution of particulate matter in the air by petrol cars is 0.06
percent and diesel cars is 1.17 percent. And would you want to know the star contributors
in this list? Bakeries- 5.8% , Paved road dust – 11.8% , Unpaved road dust-
17.76%, Construction- 8% , Garbage dump burning – 10.84%, and right at the top
, Powerplants-20.99%
Pollution and its pitfalls are true. But if we are going to
comprehensively target only objects with tailpipes – much less diesel engines
above 2000cc as the sole reason for bad air and diseases, then let that be some
sort of personal satisfaction. Because that’s doing nothing to eradicate
pollution.
I do feel like taking a naturally aspirated inline six cylinder
petrol Porche and howling and burning
some rubber and doing a orchestra in front of the premises of the Ministry of State for Power and Renewable
energy to make them understand the seriousness. But this blog is all I have…
Maybe I will start with a “conscious decision” to save
environment by walking out of the washroom with dripping hands.
