ENVIRONMENTAL POLLUTION - CAN IT BE CONTROLLED
Published on : Saturday 01-06-2019
As results of the General Elections 2019 started coming in on the morning of May 23rd, it became clear India will continue to have a stable government, something that is on the industry wish list all the time.
The fact that Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government has won an even more decisive mandate than what it had in 2014 augurs well for the big push needed by the industry – the long slew of reforms related mainly to labour, infrastructure and ease of doing business. These should now be the priority for the new government and receive whole hearted attention, in addition to further streamlining of the GST. As investment guru Mark Mobius said while talking to a leading financial daily after the full results were declared, “India is really looking very bright. If you look at the performance of all emerging markets, you see India stand out. It is really jumping ahead of the others and that is very important.” The cover story this month on environmental pollution makes a case for some hard decisions the country has to make in this area. India has the dubious distinction of having 22 of its cities in the list of the world’s 30 most polluted cities. There is a huge cost associated with this. A study by IIT-Bombay had found that air pollution cost Mumbai and Delhi US $10.66 billion (approximately Rs 70,000 crore) in 2015, or about 0.71% of the country’s GDP. According to a 2017 study by British medical journal Lancet, pollution can bring down economic output by as much as 2 per cent annually in less developed countries. So for tackling this menace of pollution and environmental degradation, it is essential to ensure that industry works actively to be carbon neutral.
And this is possible, as a recent release from Bosch has shown. The company will be fully climate-neutral as early as next year. It’s over 400 locations worldwide, and their engineering, manufacturing, and administrative facilities, will no longer leave a carbon footprint. This will make Bosch the first major industrial enterprise to achieve this ambitious goal in a little over a year. According to Dr Volkmar Denner, chairman of the board of management of Robert Bosch GmbH, in the years to 2030, the company will gradually increase the share of renewable energy in the power that it generates and buys, and will invest a billion euros to boost its locations’ energy efficiency.
According to the International Energy Agency, manufacturing accounts for around 32 per cent of global carbon dioxide emissions. It is time for industry to initiate steps to reduce its carbon footprint. This editorial is from the magazine for the month of feb 2020 to here from the experts & industry proffessionals subscribe now by visiting this link.(https://www.industrialautomationindia.in/subscription)
