This has been a hot week for climate talks. The two laggards, China and the US, both departed from their no commitment stand to boldly announce the following: the US to reduce its carbon emissions by 17 per cent over 2005 levels, and China to reduce the intensity (CO2 emissions per unit of output) by 40-45 percent. Europe has already promised a 40 per cent cut in per capita terms....

Greenpeace today released a report – “Still Waiting” – which reveals that despite growth in electricity generation – and increasing carbon emissions – the rural poor continue to be deprived of electricity. The report challenges the government’s energy model and recommends a decentralised energy mix as a solution to overcome social injustice and mitigate climate change. The report compares the electricity supply scenarios among rural and urban areas in five...

International environmental activist group Greenpeace has released a report, Still Waiting, which reveals that despite growth in electricity generation and increasing carbon emissions, India's rural poor continue to be deprived of electricity. The report challenges the government's energy model and recommends a decentralised energy mix as a solution to overcome social injustice and mitigate climate change. The report compares the electricity supply scenarios in rural and urban areas of five states...

A seminar titled Food Security and Sustainability in India, organized at Amritsar between 7 and 8 November by the GAD Institute of Development Studies, a NGO, at Guru Nanak Dev University, Amritsar, brought together government officials, scientists, academicians and NGOs so as to generate discussions and debates surrounding climate change and global warming and their impact on agriculture. The Copenhagen Summit on Climate Change is going to take place between...

More suggestions that biofuels are not an environmental free lunch ONCE upon a time, biofuels were thought of as a solution to fossil-fuel dependence. Now they are widely seen as a boondoggle to agribusiness that hurts the environment and cheats taxpayers. A report commissioned by the United Nations endorses neither extreme. It gives high marks to some crop-based fuels and lambasts others. Meanwhile, two papers published in Science, a leading...