By Darryl D’Monte,  26.06.15

For decades, Mumbai has challenged Delhi by claiming to be the country’s most developed metropolis.

The commercial capital steals a march over the nation’s capital in density – it tops the world’s list with 29,650 persons per square km; Kolkata comes second globally.

However, by an important environmental comparison, Mumbai fares worse than Delhi.

It has more urban heat islands, despite being located on the coast and registering lower maximum temperatures.

The difference between these heat islands and other parts of the city can be as much as 13 degrees Celsius, according to a new study by Aparna Dwivedi, M.V. Khire and B.K. Mohan at IIT-Bombay’s Centre for Studies in Resources Engineering.

Kurla and Andheri East figure among the warmest areas. High population and building densities, concrete buildings and roads and the distance away from the sea are to blame.

The authors find that unplanned and uncontrolled urbanisation has contributed to this anomaly.

“Such construction ends up using lots of heat-absorbing construction materials (e.g. stone, metal and concrete) across buildings, roads, pavements, footpaths, parking lots, and terraces in urban areas,” they say.

“The corresponding reduction of natural vegetation and water bodies results in higher temperatures in urban areas which may seem to be localized effect but in long-term it may contribute to the global heat.”

“Similar studies have been conducted elsewhere in the world in densely populated cities, like Hong Kong. As an architecture and urban design researcher, the lesson to be drawn from the study is to design better buildings, and avoid excessive use of glass and cement,” Dwivedi told indiaclimatedialogue.net.

Temperatures can vary from 36.27 degrees Celsius in Andheri, inland near the airport, to 23 degrees at the same time in the Sanjay Gandhi National Park, which occupies 104 sq. km, and is the city’s green lung.

However other scientists point to flaws in the study and believe that an “urban heat island intensity” of 10-13 degrees is not possible. Neither can the park have a temp of 23 degrees Celsius during summer, when nearby Andheri is at 36.

Greater Mumbai, the city proper, officially comprises 430 sq. km, but rises to 480 sq. km once wetlands, saltpans and mangroves are included.

For the study, land surface temperatures were calculated by using satellite data which measured reflectance of light, known as the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI).

Four categories of surface temperatures were chosen: built-up land, barren land, vegetation and water.

“There is a drastic change in temperature in the morning around 5.30 am between built-up and vegetation areas of Mumbai,” the authors state.

Temperatures are related to land use and population of the city, they add. “This might result in bigger issues of changing rainfall patterns and intensities, threatened biodiversity and consequently hampered sustainable development.”

Delhi does better

The IIT-B study is corroborated by a comparative study by Delhi University scientists.

The capital comprises both urban and rural areas.

Aakriti Grover, a research scholar, and Ram Babu Singh, who heads the geography department of the Delhi School of Economics, show that Delhi has nearly 300 sq. km of green cover, compared to Mumbai’s 122 sq. km.

The Ridge forest and Yamuna river play a role in lowering temperatures.

The Yamuna records a minimum temperature of 23 degrees Celsius where it is deepest. As the water composition changes, with solid waste and sand, the temperature rises to nearly 28 degrees.

It is able to store and transfer heat. Since it passes through six districts, it acts as a heat moderator, just like the drains of Delhi.

The surface temperatures in the capital vary from 23 to 40 degrees Celsius. In that respect, the two cities are similar, but they differ over heat island locations.

The hottest parts of Delhi are in the west, especially the south-west. The lower temperatures are in the centre and south, and moderate in the north and east.

Mumbai records lower temperatures on the peripheries and coast, but is “highly heated in the centre”, the IIT-Bombay study shows.

“There are number of (other) studies on Indian cities e.g. Surat, Ahmedabad and Chennai,” Grover toldindiaclimatedialogue.net.

“Mumbai is worst affected due to its high-rises and very low vegetative cover. In view of increasing urbanisation, Delhi and Hyderabad are likely to go to the way of Mumbai. But these cities don’t have (so many) high-rises presently.”

Raghu Murtugudde from the University of Maryland told indiaclimatedialogue.net, “Humidity adds to the heat index and many pollutants are hygroscopic so they get heavier with humidity. I think it is the humidity that makes the Mumbai heat island much worse.”

“Urban heat island research in the US mostly looked at the coastal vs interior urban islands from the perspective of impacts on storms. But for Mumbai, seasonality has to be considered while compared to Delhi or any other place. Let’s say you go from Powai in the suburbs to Andheri or Vikhroli. The temperature will basically be the same because temperatures get homogenized on fairly large scales by winds and the heating is basically similar except for small differences in urban heat island and so on.”

“But you can have heavy rain in Powai but no rain in Andheri or Vikhroli because rain is caused by instabilities and fronts and moving storm systems or thunderstorms and these can happen on very small scales.”

Murtugudde added, “Think of a pot in which you are making popcorn. The pot is heated to the same temperature but popcorns pop in different locations randomly. Rainfall is always like popcorn popping even though the scales can be sometimes large in monsoon systems.”

Talking about the IIT-Bombay study, Murtugudde said it “needs to be reaffirmed since high temperature contrasts in such short distances have not been reported before. Mumbai tends to have very large precipitation [rainfall] gradients but this is expected from the short decorrelation scales of precipitation. Some local temperature inversion or some other factor may generate temperature gradients but it
needs to be explored mechanistically.”

“As for the surface heat island comparisons between Mumbai and Delhi, we have to be careful about two things – the satellite products for temperature and vegetation are highly dependent on the so-called atmospheric corrections.”

“By the time you derive NDVI, it is only about 10% of the total signal measured by the satellite. So the humidity levels and aerosol corrections done for the products being used for deriving temperatures and NDVI may be global models which may not be valid for specific regions in India at high resolutions.”

Criticizing the IIT-Bombay study, Murtugudde said, “I suspect the statement that heat islands are not significant over Delhi but are strong over Mumbai. I would also check the atmospheric heat islands and compare aerosol and humidity levels even if crudely to make an estimate of the errors in the derived quantities. And use some weather station data to confirm the results instead of relying totally on satellite data.”

A third study on a related index also puts Mumbai in a bad light – literally – in relation to Delhi. Surprisingly, again, very recent research by the Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology (IITM) has found that Mumbai is exposed to more ultraviolet (UV) radiation than the capital.

In a pilot study done in the latter half of May this year, as many as 13 of the 15 days in the city were in the “high-risk” category, with an average of UV index of 8.2.

The UV index measures the amount of harmful radiation in sunlight reaching the earth’s surface at a given location — where 0 indicates no risk, 1-4 indicates a low risk of overexposure and above 10 signifies an extreme risk.

Any index between 7 and 10 exposes people who are advised to avoid direct exposure to the sun.

Gufran Beig, who conducted the IITM study and also heads SAFAR – System of Air Quality & Weather Forecasting & Research – for the Earth Sciences Ministry, warns, “Overexposure to the sun’s UV radiation can cause immediate effects, such as sunburn; and long-term problems, such as skin cancer and cataracts.”

It also causes “changes in cells of the skin, fibrous tissue and blood vessels leading to premature skin aging… Another long-term effect is an inflammatory reaction of the eye.”

He finds that UV radiation is high near water bodies and sand because there is more reflection than absorption of solar radiation.

What is more, Mumbai is near the equator and “more vulnerable than Delhi and Pune because it is surrounded by the sea and urban heat islands are forming because of dismal greenery,” says Beig.

Under SAFAR, one or two sensors will be installed in Delhi and Pune. However, ten sensors will be placed in Mumbai, depending on the topography.

“There are variations in Mumbai’s landscape,” according to Beig, “with some areas close to the sea, some with green spaces and some barren. We want to record UV radiation to assess the situation.”

According to Abdul Wadud of the Ranchi-based Birsa Agriculture University, UV rays are of three types – A, B and C. UV-C gets filtered due to the ozone layer, while A and B reach the earth’s surface.

Murtugudde told indiaclimatedialogue.net, “It is true that UV-B can cause problems when it rises above the threshold. UV-B is naturally higher during summer since more radiation is coming in and during the pre-monsoon, India sees peak surface radiation due to lack of clouds.”

“But it is totally erroneous to say that UV contributes to warming. UV impacts are mostly in terms of skin cancer and other damages to the DNA itself. Despite our high melanin content, we can be burned by high UV-B.”

The climate scientist added, “I suspect the pre-monsoon activities in the farm may be a big factor for heat strokes and deaths. Day-by-day variations of UV have to be put in the context of the seasonal peaks since daily variations can be simply due to weather related filtering at the surface level.”

“Any radiation that comes to the surface is also affected by humidity content and dust, etc. So within the summer peak, we will have spatial variability in surface UV-A and UV-B levels.”

By Darryl D’Monte , 21.07.15

Infosys, India’s second largest IT company, is to spend Rs 400 crore ($62.7 million) to turn carbon-neutral by 2018 by saving on commuting and travel by its 180,000-odd employees.

The $8.7 billion company – with clients in 50 countries – is already working to halve its per capita electricity consumption from its 2007-08 levels and source all its power from renewable resources by 2018, accordingThe Climate Group, a global non-profit.

Ramadas Kamath, Executive Vice President and Head of Infrastructure and Sustainability at Infosys, said: “We are working towards building a clean energy future. Expanding the share of renewables is key to addressing the chronic energy crisis our country is facing today. By taking the first step towards 100% renewables, we want to lead the way in creating a sustainable future and bring about an energy transformation in India.”

During 2015, Bengaluru-based Infosys met 29% of its electricity needs – about 72 million units – for its offices across India through renewables. During the same period, it generated over 2,911 MWh of electricity through its onsite solar photo-voltaic installations across India.

In May, Infosys also became the first Indian company to join RE100, a global platform for major companies committed to 100% renewable power.

RE100 is led by The Climate Group, in partnership with CDP, a global alliance for driving sustainable economies. It works with the support of the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA).

CDP was formerly known as the Carbon Disclosure Project, before it added programmes on water and forests. It works with corporations in India.

Infosys plans to offset the 370,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide that employees emit every year by commuting by car or two-wheelers and by catching flights.

The project is especially important in a city whose work force is growing by leaps and bounds. According to a recent report, 264 square feet of built-up space was added in Bengaluru every minute between 2006 and 2012. Given the city’s notoriously bad public transport, most employees are forced to travel by their own vehicles.

To offset such emissions, Infosys will spend Rs 70 crore this year on installing solar panels in villages, thereby cutting down on villagers’ smoky fuel – wood or kerosene.

Besides afforesting barren rural areas, it will distribute more efficient and smokeless cookstoves. Traditional stoves contribute to the regional climate phenomenon known as the “Asian Brown Cloud”.

It will also set up biogas plants – a proven, small-scale and site-specific technology that has fallen out of favour due to the emphasis on solar and wind energy.

Kamath said that its programmes were in sync with guidelines issued by the UN and other agencies. These would have the maximum social impact and were subject to audit by international bodies.

Asked whether it wasn’t easier for Infosys, being in IT, to become carbon-neutral than companies which are into manufacturing or infrastructure, Damandeep Singh, India Director of CDP, told indiaclimatedialogue.net, “While companies in the manufacturing sector may have higher emissions, the IT sector is still carbon-intensive and businesses operating here have much to do to become low-carbon.”

“India’s complicated laws also don’t make it easy for companies to procure renewable energy (RE). Infosys’ commitment will inspire other companies, within IT and other sectors, to think about how to make this switch.”

By the same token, being web-savvy, isn’t the company more amenable to organising teleconferences and the like to cut down on travel?

“Many of India’s top corporates now use teleconferences and webinars to cut down on travel and improve efficiency,” Singh replied. “However, according to Greenpeace, IT-related global emissions are now equivalent to the aviation sector. The IT industry has to grapple with issues like servers and data centres and how to keep them at best temperatures, besides ensuring that their buildings are appropriately designed.”

“An increasing number of businesses are now striving towards low-carbon or carbon-neutral goals, including through offsets. CDP encourages companies to accurately account for their gross emissions and take appropriate measures to reduce them before considering offsetting. The businesses which are committing to procure 100% of their energy from renewable sources are helping to drive down their emissions and drive up corporate renewable power consumption.”

According to the CDP India head, “The project with Infosys is under the Road to Paris initiative which has six components in all. We are conducting workshops with companies to explain the concept and to get more to sign up. As of now Hindustan Construction Co (HCC) and Wipro —another  major IT company in Bengaluru — have also signed up to different initiatives.”

Wipro the pioneer

P.S. Narayan, Vice President and Head of the Sustainability Programme at Wipro, told indiaclimatedialogue.net, “We reduced our operational emissions footprint by 60%, amounting to more than 80,000 tonnes between 2010 and 2015. We now are setting up targets till 2020 and beyond till 2050. RE and energy efficiency are the two cornerstones of our greenhouse gas reduction programme and will continue to be so.”

Narayan added, “The decisions on renewable energy targets have to be based on several external factors including the regulatory environment and supply-side dynamics. In India, the situation is more complex as electricity is eventually a state subject.”

“We are also carefully evaluating offset programmes to ensure that projects are sustainable in the long run and do not have other adverse impacts. Therefore, while at Wipro, our goal setting on RE will be ambitious, it will be informed by a detailed assessment of how we think the RE scenario will unfold in India over the next few years.”

Damandeep Singh sidestepped a query as to how HCC, which has constructed the Bandra-Worli Sea Link (BWSL) in Mumbai – which promotes commuting by car – and has also built Lavasa, a greenfield township in a forested valley, could figure as of one of the 119 companies in the world in CDP’s Road to Paris initiative.

This commits businesses to caring for the climate, in the long and winding road to the UN climate convention in Paris this December, but it also gives rise to the suspicion that CDP permits some companies to ‘greenwash’ their image by signing up for the arduous journey.

Sandeep Sawant, HCC’s General Manager Corporate Communications, told indiaclimatedialogue.net that it was only the contractor for the BWSL – the decision to build it was taken by the government. HCC was not claiming it was reducing emissions in BWSL’s operations.

Vikram Tanwer, HCC’s Manager Corporate Communications, told indiaclimatedialogue.net that it has been utilizing a variety of power conservation measures to lower energy usage and reduce its environmental impact.

It conserved energy through use of load sharing systems in diesel generator sets, automatic power factor controller panels, starters for crusher motors and energy-efficient motors in gantry cranes. It has reduced the use of cement by 22,612 tonnes, which has also generated 22,612 fewer tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions – each tonne of cement produced emits an equivalent tonne of carbon dioxide. This has saved the company Rs 142 crore.

Meanwhile, a handful of Indian businesses are taking the initiative to implement transport demand management (TDM) strategies, according to two Indian bloggers from the Washington-based World Resources Institute, which has offices in Bengaluru, Delhi and Mumbai, in TheCityFix.

These strategies have been especially common in IT, given the availability of information — such as employees’ origins and destinations, duration and frequency of trips — for designing optimal transit and carpool routes.

Some initiatives have included providing employees with commuter subsidies for public transport or carpooling. Other businesses have experimented with company buses that transport workers from nearby metro stations to offices, providing much-needed “last-mile connectivity”.

As many as 30-50% of the targeted employees have switched from cars to public transport. Employees are more productive due to shorter commutes, and bus and other public transit subsidies are much cheaper compared to private company buses.

Wipro worked with the Bengaluru Metropolitan Transport Corporation (BMTC) on specific routes to provide quality bus services to its employees and other transit riders. This initiative reduced employee emissions by almost 16% in the first year of implementation.

Metro to bus

Another example is the “I-Travel Smart” initiative of Genpact — another global IT company – in Gurgaon, next to New Delhi. Genpact has reduced travel by about 1.2 million km annually and has saved about 335 tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions.

It provides a free shuttle service from nearby metro stations to all Genpact sites. This is aided by a commuter guidebook for all employees with alternative transport options; preferred parking locations for those who choose to carpool; and designated bus services in partnership with Haryana and Delhi transport corporations as well as bus manufacturer Volvo.

In May, the Business and Climate Summit in Paris mobilized 25 global business networks representing over 6.5 million companies from more than 130 countries to pledge to lead the transition to a low-carbon, climate resilient economy by developing solutions. In India, some large IT companies are taking the lead.

Darryl D’Monte, July 10, 2015

At a public meeting convened by the Mumbai Waterfronts Centre (MWC) on June 24, the Dutch Consul in Mumbai, Arend Gouw, said that the city’s ambitious, expensive Rs 11,300-crore coastal road, if not planned properly, would “homogenise” the coast.

He then corrected this to “destroy”.

On June 5, Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte attended a meeting with Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, where he announced Dutch technical assistance for the 34.6-km-long road—53 years after it was first planned—to be built at a cost of Rs 322 crore per km, or only Rs 28-crore per km less than Mumbai’s future Metro lines.

Holland has considerable experience in reclaiming land from the sea, but it does that to protect the coastal areas, vast tracts of which lie below the sea.

Rutte and other Dutch experts mentioned that in Holland, the government always considers the views of stakeholders before finalising a project. This saves both time and money.

The reverse has occurred with Mumbai’s coastal highway.

Make the plan, then call for comments

Dutch experts suggested incorporating the third Metro line, which traverses much of the route along the west coast, in the road. Fadnavis welcomed the proposal and is taking it further.

Mumbai Metro Rail officials present also pointed out that this Metro route was already finalised and in any case, a Metro along the sea wouldn’t be connected with existing rail and Metro lines inland.

Although the consultants presented the detailed project report (DPR) on the road on Mumbai’s western seafront this February, the municipal corporation only made it public on June 24.

This was after Union environment minister Prakash Javadekar cleared the road, connecting Nariman Point in south Mumbai to Kandiva li in the northern suburbs, on June 8, subject to two conditions:

One, to reclaim as little land for the project; such reclamation was halted in 1974 after protests by environmentalists.

Second, to retain the current building restrictions under the Coastal Regulation Zone (CRZ). These prohibit construction within 500 metres of the high-tide line.

Since the road will be constructed some 100-200 metres off the coast, there was the danger that the high-tide line would have been pushed back by that much, permitting construction on some of India’s most expensive real estate.

Activists attended a meeting convened by the MWC on July 3 to list their objections to the project, originally mooted by Los Angeles-based planners in 1962.

The DPR reveals the lack of institutional support for a coherent mobility policy, according to Rishi Aggarwal from the Observer Research Foundation.

How car traffic to downtown Mumbai is drying up

A Unified Metropolitan Transport Authority (UMTA) was set up in 2008, but various agencies planned stand-alone projects without consulting each other.

In its current avatar, the coastal road was conceived by former Chief Minister Prithviraj Chouhan and was to be built originally by the state government. However, the BJP coalition in the state has handed it over to the municipal corporation, the long-time fiefdom of its political partner, the Shiv Sena.

The authorities should have identified earlier road projects, including tunnels, which have not been executed, before taking on a project that will change the face of the city, Aggarwal said.

What is the coastal road for, asked Hussain Indorewalla, a professor of the Kamala Raheja College of Architecture. While Javadekar said that the coastal road is meant to decongest the city, Indorewalla believed it would be counter-productive.

When Nitin Gadkari was the PWD minister in the BJP-Sena coalition in the state in the early 1990s, he built 55 flyovers in Mumbai. While these eased traffic temporarily, the number of cars increased, creating traffic snarls.

The DPR itself cites how due to the global economic downturn, the population  growth of Mumbai has slowed perceptibly. Between 2001 and 2011, the city only grew by 500,000 people.

It shows that the growth in car traffic will peak at 3% per annum between 2015 and 2019, slowing down to 0.3% between 2040 and 2043, an average of only 1.7% in these 28 years.

It estimated a maximum of 34,090 cars per day in 2014 through the existing Bandra-Worli Sea Link (BWSL), which was built in 2009 and will be connected to the road. This dropped to 11,378 cars at its southernmost section at Nariman Point.

In 2044, it estimated at most 61,749 cars a day at BWSL, dropping to 27,616 at Nariman Point.

Nariman Point and south Mumbai are losing their clout as the old central business district. They are ceding ground to the Bandra-Kurla Complex, where real estate prices are higher. Other centres have opened up in the suburbs too for IT and other industries.