Editorial 1 : On India’s ‘heat action plans’
Context
The IMD has also predicted an increase in the maximum temperature and the frequency of heatwave conditions in the forthcoming days over eastern and southern India, raising the question of India’s readiness to face this hazard.
What is a heatwave?
- According to the IMD, the definition of a heatwave depends on the physiography of regions.
- The IMD will declare a heatwave if the maximum temperature recorded at a station is 40 degrees Celsius or more in the plains, 37 degrees Celsius or more in the coast, and 30 degrees Celsius or more in the hills.
- A heatwave’s severity is determined by its departure from normal temperature.
- There is a ‘normal heatwave’ when the departure is by 4.5-6.4 degrees Celsius and a ‘severe heatwave’ if the departure is greater.
- Heatwave declaration could also be based on actual maximum temperature: a ‘heatwave’ is when this figure is greater than 45 degrees Celsius and a ‘severe heatwave’ when greater than 47 degrees Celsius.
- The IMD takes the latter two ‘routes’ only when at least two stations in a meteorological subdivision report such a high maximum or when at least one station has recorded a corresponding departure from the normal for at least two consecutive days.
Tackling heatwaves
- With the severity and frequency of heatwaves increasing across the country, governments at various levels — State, district, and city — have prepared heat action plans (HAPs).
- HAPs aim to increase preparedness and lower the adverse impacts of extreme heat by outlining strategies and measures to prepare for, address, and recover from heatwaves.
- The National Disaster Management Authority and IMD are reported to be working with 23 States to develop HAPs.
- There is no centralised database on HAPs, but at least 23 HAPs exist at the State and city level, with a few States, such as Odisha and Maharashtra, laying out district-level HAPs.
- HAPs in India follow a general pattern. They provide a snapshot of regions’ heat profile, including information on the number of past heatwave events, yearly trends in the summer maximum temperature, land surface temperature, and so on, followed by a vulnerability assessment which maps out regions that require immediate attention and a response plan.
The recommendations
- HAPs typically suggest a combination of measures such as using forecasts and early warning systems to alert the public and relevant authorities about heatwaves, educating the public through campaigns that provide information on risks associated with heatwaves, building heat shelters and cooling centres, and providing clean drinking water to avoid dehydration.
- HAPs provide directives for hospitals to be well equipped with supplies and an adequate number of trained healthcare workers to recognise and treat a large influx of patients with heat-related illnesses.
- HAPs also suggest long-term measures such as adopting urban planning strategies that promote tree planting, using heat-resistant building materials to reduce urban heat island effect, and using cool roofing technologies to reduce solar absorption, thereby decreasing indoor temperatures.
Way forward
- The scope of a heatwave needs to be expanded to accommodate humid heat and warmer nights in addition to extreme dry heat. This requires the development of a heat index that accounts for multiple factors beyond temperature.
- While most HAPs have conducted vulnerability assessments during the development of the plans, the methods adopted are inconsistent. It is, therefore, time to transition to a robust, full-fledged climate risk assessment that can identify the likelihood of heatwaves in different areas and estimate the exposure of people and important assets to heatwaves while factoring in inherent vulnerabilities.
- Also, hotspot mapping for prioritising and formulating targeted interventions is needed, which is now possible with easy-to-access geospatial data.
- There is a need to allocate dedicated budgets for HAPs.
- HAPs currently are stand-alone plans with limited finance. Pooling in resources would be possible if they are integrated with broader action plans promoting urban resilience and climate adaptation.
Editorial 2 : The Great Indian Bustard and climate action verdict
Context
In a recent judgment, the Supreme Court of India has recognised the existence of a fundamental right to be free from the adverse impacts of climate change. The judgment has garnered significant attention from environmentalists, mostly focusing only on its impacts on the protection of the Great Indian Bustard.
The Critically Endangered Great Indian Bustard
- The States of Rajasthan and Gujarat are home to the critically endangered Great Indian Bustard.
- At the same time, both States also hold significant potential for the development of solar and wind power.
- In 2019, certain public-spirited individuals (petitioners), filed a public interest litigation, seeking conservation of the bustard.
- In the interim, they sought an order seeking a ban on further construction of solar and wind energy infrastructure, and the laying of overhead power transmission lines linked to these.
- They argued that these power lines were a hazard, causing the bustards to die due to frequent collisions with the lines.
- In its decision the Supreme Court imposed a blanket ban on the laying of overhead power lines in the included areas identified as priority and potential areas for bustard conservation. The Court also passed an order for undergrounding existing power lines, both high and low voltage.
- The government challenged this order citing India’s international climate commitments on transitioning to non-fossil fuels and reducing carbon emissions. It argued that the area, it reiterated, held a major proportion of the country’s wind and solar energy potential.
- Further, it argued that undergrounding power lines was practically impossible. Lastly, it attributed the decline in the bustard population to other factors such as poaching, habitat destruction, and predation.
The right accorded
- Much of Indian environmental law has developed through the Court’s judicial decisions in public interest cases. In several cases, it has transplanted, recognised, and articulated environmental rights and legal principles.
- While appreciated for being proactive, this practice has been critiqued for judicial overreach and the creation of imprecise rights.
- Contrastingly, in this decision, the Court’s approach has been that of restraint.
- Arguably, this is an optimal approach at this early stage of the recognition of the right — in that, it catalyses the discourse on climate rights, simultaneously providing time and space for articulating a more informed right.
- However, it must be noted that the Court’s recognition of the right does not appear in the operative part of the judgment. Therefore, it is not binding per se
- While it will be instrumental in shaping future climate action, the extent to which it can do so remains to be seen.
Just transition framework
- Going forward, adopting an alternative approach could preclude this conundrum.
- This approach is: utilising the just transition framework.
- Currently being used in climate cases around the world, it aims to make transitions to a low carbon economy more equitable and inclusive.
- It particularly serves the interests of those most affected by such transitions.
- This includes, inter alia, workers, vulnerable communities, and small and medium-sized enterprises.
- This approach is advantageous in three ways. First, it will preclude climate action and protection of biodiversity from being pitted as adversarial choices. Instead, it can create a case for inclusive climate action, i.e., climate action alive to varied rights and interests.
- Second, it can enable the articulation of more reflexive and inclusive climate rights. To that end, utilising it in climate litigation can ensure that articulation and enforcement of climate rights are sensitive to the interests of the non-human nature and furthers ecological justice.
- Third, if the framework is used in the final decision of the Court, this case will be one of the first just transition litigations to consider a non-human interest.
Way forward
- A right against climate change has been recognised and is yet to be articulated. This provides a productive space for initiating a discourse on the content of the right — an opportunity to make it inclusive and effective.
- However, this burden is a shared one. It falls not only on the state but also on activists, litigants, and academics — who provide content to rights by participating (indirectly or directly) in the process of their recognition, articulation, and enforcement.