India's villages can play a key role in the fight against climate change. But will their slow progress and limited resources hinder hitting the carbon neutral goal, or will new technologies help them succeed?
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00:00Nearly 70% of India's population lives in villages.
00:09Experts say villages are key to net-zero carbon dioxide emissions.
00:13Could they be the key to helping India meet its carbon-neutral targets by 2050?
00:19But progress in villages is slower compared to cities, change is slow, and old habits
00:24die hard.
00:26Yet some rural areas have reduced their carbon footprint.
00:30How close will your village be to net-zero by 2050?
00:41Geeta Kumari is an 18-year-old woman who lives in Sirsa Machipur village near Uttar Pradesh's
00:47Noida city.
00:49About 2,750 people live here.
00:52It's not very far from the capital New Delhi, but lags behind in terms of development.
00:57Geeta is a science teacher at the village's secondary school.
01:00Today, she is teaching students how to convert temperatures from degrees Celsius to Fahrenheit.
01:06She is one of the very few women who completed her education here.
01:10Now she is preparing for medical school entrance exams to become a doctor.
01:18Most people in her village are involved in agriculture.
01:22They rely on non-renewable energy sources.
01:39Almost every village in India shares a similar story.
01:42But can they contribute to the country's net neutrality goals?
01:53Geeta Kumari is the head of climate change and water and air reform.
01:5865-70% of the population still lives in villages.
02:01But the problem of climate change and water and air reform has not been created by the
02:07village.
02:08It has been created by the people of the city, by the industry, by the big companies.
02:13Despite this, I would like to say that there are options.
02:17We can do a lot to reduce the impact of climate change.
02:22So what exactly is carbon net neutrality?
02:25When we talk about carbon neutrality, we first have to look at where greenhouse gases are
02:30coming from.
02:31And then either we use different technologies to reduce where they are coming from.
02:36Or we can use sequester, like carbon dioxide is absorbed in trees.
02:43We can plant more trees.
02:48Hi, my name is Shalu Agrawal.
02:51And I am an energy policy researcher.
02:56Bhartiya village, with the help of government and through community support,
03:00is making itself energy efficient.
03:03And at the same time, the way of life is changing.
03:08But in Geeta's village, many homes do not have electricity.
03:12For those who have it, it is irregular and costs a lot of money.
03:17There are many homes that do not have electricity.
03:20They are using candles and batteries.
03:22The village's literacy rates are low and school dropout rates are high.
03:27This is partly due to a lack of constant energy sources to allow children,
03:31especially girls, to study at home.
03:34The girls in our village have problems studying because they do not have electricity at home.
03:39That is why there should be proper light for them.
03:42There should be a facility that keeps the light on.
03:46There are more than 6 lakh villages in India.
03:49And almost two-thirds of India's population lives in villages.
03:54Which is why we say India lives in the villages.
03:56Despite having such a large population,
04:00the contribution of villages to India's energy demand is still only one-third.
04:06Between 2000 and 2020, about 800 million people
04:11who did not have electricity got electricity for the first time.
04:19This village Palli is now connected to a 200 kilowatt solar-powered mini-grid.
04:25Shruti Galhotra is 23 years old and is a software developer.
04:29She tells us how the mini-grid has transformed the lives of people in her village.
04:35When solar lights come on, they automatically keep on working.
04:38First it goes to the grid and then we get electricity.
04:42We can use all of it.
04:44We have motor pumps for water at home.
04:47And fans, lights, whatever we want to use.
04:51Refrigerator.
04:52We can use all of it.
04:55The electricity is coming from our solar panels.
04:58The Indian government has launched a very ambitious scheme.
05:01It is called PM Surya Ghar Yojana.
05:03And the objective of this scheme is to reach about 1 crore Indian homes with rooftop solar.
05:13All farmers in Geeta's village use heavy industrial pesticides on the crops for better yield
05:19and they grow water-intensive crops, such as rice.
05:22India is the second largest rice producer in the world.
05:25A significant share of the world's rice harvest is produced by wet rice cultivation like this.
05:31Besides its significant water footprint, wet rice cultivation is a large contributor to methane emissions.
05:55Once produce is grown, food storage presents another challenge for villagers.
06:00India wastes 74 million tonnes of food every year.
06:04A staggering loss of 10.8 billion US dollars, which makes it world's second biggest food waster.
06:11A big factor is the lack of cold storage facilities for the produce.
06:16Green Energy has helped solve this and brought Majolia village technological advancement.
06:24My name is Chanda Kumari.
06:26I am from Majolia village, Jaffa panchayat, Bochham block, Mujaffarpur district.
06:31I am a farmer.
06:36Earlier, I did not have a coal stove.
06:38Nor did I have one in my village.
06:41It was very far away, like in the city.
06:44We could not reach there.
06:46It would dry up after we brought it home.
06:49The next day, we would take it to the market.
06:52It would not be profitable.
06:54That is why my goods would get spoilt.
06:57After that, we got a coal stove.
07:01It is not powered by electricity.
07:04It is powered by solar energy, like sunlight.
07:07It is powered by solar energy, like sunlight.
07:15It does not spread carbon.
07:18It is not powered by electricity.
07:20It is powered by sunlight.
07:22It has good cooling.
07:24After getting solar energy,
07:26my goods and the goods of other farmers are not spoilt.
07:31They are safe.
07:34The village of Kapikona has also introduced innovative solutions to traditional ways of life
07:40in a bid to clean up air pollution and increase knowledge and care about the environment.
07:46My name is Anjana.
07:48I am coming from Kapikona village in Meenangadi.
07:54In Meenangadi, carbon neutrality mainly focuses on the emission sector and carbon sequestration.
08:00Here, in the emission sector, we are categorized into four major sectors.
08:04Energy, waste, afforestation and transportation sector.
08:09Here, we can identify the transportation and energy sector that will be contributing.
08:15We are mainly focusing the afforestation program like tree banging, oxygen park, green island.
08:21Here, around 40 varieties of bamboos were planted to initiate this school and supported by the panchayat.
08:29The farmers here plant trees, which are geotagged.
08:33The age and health of each tree is updated on an app.
08:37The village council office deposits a few rupees annually into the farmers' bank accounts for each tree,
08:44provided they do not cut them.
08:47In rural India, the traditional chulha stove is still widely used for cooking.
08:51But it comes at a steep cost to both people's health and the environment.
08:56In homes, the impact can be deadly.
08:59Household air pollution from dirty stoves and fuel claims the lives of 3.8 million people annually.
09:07The toxic smoke contains harmful gases like carbon dioxide, methane and fine particles that accelerate global warming.
09:16In Geeta's village, most women cook using these traditional chulhas with firewood and cow dung cakes.
09:23In Minangadi, some households are switching to cleaner fuel like biogas.
09:28This is a pit used for organic waste and the chamber converts the waste slurry over time to mainly methane and carbon dioxide.
09:37This tea is made on the gas supplied through pipes from a biogas plant.
09:49While there are solutions, there are gaps in their smooth implementation.
09:53Many solar pumps, cookers and biogas plants remain unused.
10:06We need to create a model that is scientifically good, but does not make the local people unable to understand it.
10:19We need to create a model with simple indicators.
10:23Local people should be able to understand the emissions from the economic activity we are doing.
10:31Not just a scientist or a bureaucrat will be able to run the whole process.
10:38Big technologies like solar, wind, biomass, agriculture, natural farming, everything requires finance.
10:48The government should provide subsidy, but programs cannot be scaled through subsidies.
10:53For this, we need to create a business model and affordable patient capital.
10:59Through this finance, we can make this technology accessible to the villages.
11:03Reducing the carbon footprint is also a big goal for meeting local climate action plans.
11:09Geeta wants her village to be clean.
11:12She wants people to reduce waste and keep their surroundings clean.
11:16Our village is getting polluted because the garbage is being thrown into the lake.
11:22In our village, there is a lot of cow dung and cow dung is also thrown into the lake.
11:30Water is also thrown into the lake.
11:33People go to the forest to use the toilet.
11:37In our village, toilets are not an option.
11:40Children get sick because of the pollution.
11:44Minangadi shows a path ahead here as well.
11:49We have achieved 100% waste management through the Haridakarmasena waste collection and segregation process.
11:58In each ward, two people are assigned to collect the waste at the household level.
12:05Primary separation is done at the household level.
12:08Then the waste is sent to the centralized segregation center in Minangadi panchayat.
12:14There we have done the process of shredding, baling and separation also.
12:20After the separation, we can identify the color plastic, white plastic, cardboard, thermocol, plastic bottles and glass bottles, etc.
12:32Will Geeta's carbon neutral dream for her village come true?
12:36My dream is that our future lives will be more clean.
12:41The roads should be wide and the pollution should not spread.
12:46And our water should be clean.
12:51The water from the lake should be clean.
12:55And there should not be any waste thrown into the lake.
13:00And there should be trees and plants around us.
13:04The use of fertilizers is important.
13:08Chemicals should not be used because they cause problems to the farmers.
13:18There is no proper light.
13:20There should be a proper light.
13:22There should be a facility where the light is on.
13:26There should be a gas facility for the women so that they do not have any problem in cooking.
13:32They can cook on the gas stove.
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