What we are seeing is not development.

This is exploitation.

Every small and local thing matters?

In the city where my parents live, there is litter everywhere.  Plastic bags are one of the many eyesores.  More than an eyesore, for instance, when they clog the storm water intakes and add to urban flooding during the monsoons.

A few years ago, my father, who likes cleanliness and order, thought that perhaps he would do something at least right outside his own yard.  He talked with the "watchmen" at the neighboring buildings and told them that they could at least keep their own respective street-fronts clear of waste. People do not generally litter a clean place, but are always quick to add crap if there is a pile of waste.

It worked for a week or so.  And that was it.

In our own ways, many of us try to do what we believe are the right things in the tiny bit of the world over which we might have some say.  But, such feel-good acts do not really seem to matter in the grand scheme of things.  Does it mean that we should stop doing them?

Nope.

"Acting at the local level feels good because the results are visible and tangible."  However, we need to keep in mind that "the world is more complicated than that."  So, yes, go ahead and clear your street of plastic bags. Fight to ban single-use plastics.  Ban plastic drinking straws, if you think that is the right thing to do.  But, keep in mind what Humphrey Bogart said in a different context--they "don't amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world."

The world is intricately interconnected for our small acts in our backyards to make a huge difference.
"Everyone who is concerned about the environment knows that large-scale solutions are important."

Engaging with the environment at multiple scales is what thoughtful people do, all the time, whether they want to or not. There is no place or scale to escape to. And the question of which level of encounter is the best for the environment – or the human soul – has no easy answer.
...
Everything local is global, and vice versa. It’s a matter of continuing to participate, to question ourselves and our behaviors, to assess and reassess the needs of the planet, and hold dearly the tensions that come with trying to make positive environmental change.

I have blogged in plenty along these lines.  For instance, when it comes to recycling, I practice it--but all the while pointing out that this feel-good act doesn't make a damn difference. As I wrote a couple of months ago, I rant against feel-goodism is because it means that "we have accepted individual responsibility for a problem we have little control over."  We have been brainwashed into believing that we created these problems and that we can solve these ourselves, if only we behaved "correctly" in our homes.  Awful bullshit that is.

We need to go after the big time changes and I worry that feel-good local and individual behavior might even distract us form the urgency to press for huge systemic changes.

So, yes, go ahead to do what you can.  Feel good about it.  The tangible effect is important.  But, don't ever let go of the big changes that we need to fight for, beginning with throwing out tRump and his toadies who are doing everything they can to ruin life for all of us humans on this wonderful and unique pale blue dot.

Killing the Ganga

I don't recall when it happened during my early years, but it happened.  I read about the Ganges River.  I was confused. Ganges?

It turned out that they were referring to the Ganga.  Had I known the expression "WTF!" I would have used that over and over.  Ganges?

In the old Hindu traditions, the Ganga is more than a river.  It is the holiest of rivers.  Holiest as in every river is holy, and this was the holiest of them all.  How holy?  Here is an example: There is an "exquisite rock-cut relief showing the fall of the Ganges that was carved in the seventh century AD at Mahabalipuram, well over one thousand miles south of the basin." That holy, even back then!

(BTW, what's the deal with "AD"?  We have long ago switched to the "CE" usage.  Such a usage in the revered NYRB?  WTF!)

If only such a worship of nature had continued.  But, we humans got on to the treadmill.  And the colonizers whose religious framework encouraged them to dominate nature switched the treadmill to a different model and speed.

The Ganga is now a mess.

To anyone who surveys the Ganges from one of the industrial towns along its course—Moradabad, for example, or Kanpur—humankind can seem peculiarly negligent of its own long-term interests. The exposed banks run with factory effluents while pigs snuffle untreated sewage and India’s poorest people pan for metal in the toxic shallows. Partially cremated corpses and devotional sculptures that have been committed to the waters drift downstream alongside vast quantities of plastic and the odd dead dog. In the plangent words of Sudipta Sen, a history professor at the University of California at Davis and the author of Ganges, the river has become endowed with a twofold character: “one as the immaculate and eternal deity of the flowing waters, the other as a mundane river, repository of accumulated human misdeeds.”

I don't understand how even the faithful Hindus willingly poison the holiest river!

Who is the world for? Me and you? Or all its organisms in perpetuity, as the dominant species abstains from further wanton destruction, exercising foresight and restraint? These are the questions that latent history tells us we should be asking as India’s population grows with extraordinary speed and the country’s water stocks are spoiled or depleted.

Well, not only should people in India ask those questions--we all should, wherever we live.  Who is this world for?

Very few seem to ask such questions anymore.  And we think that traditional cultures and peoples who live consistent with that framework are not "modern."  Is modernity worth killing the Ganga?  And here I use "Ganga" as a stand in for the living and non-living natural world all around us.

The final carve-up of the Himalayas is underway. Between them, India, Pakistan, Nepal, and Bhutan have planned some four hundred large dams that would make the Himalayan rivers the most heavily dammed in the world. Inevitably, the brunt of the dams’ impact will fall on the rural poor as they lose their homes and livelihoods and in many cases join the drift to the cities, where they will meet more extensive environmental degradation.

No number of holy dips in the holy rivers will be able to absolve us of our sins :(

(Yes, I am aware of the contradictions in me blogging about this from unimaginable comforts that modernity has provided.)

Less is an enabling agent of more?

I got a hefty increase in my salary.

What will I do with the additional income? Consume it in many new and expanded ways.

Consumption is practically what the modern economy is all about, once we got beyond basic survival.  And, oddly enough, even those concerned and worried about the natural environment--including me--love to get salary increases so that we can consume more, even though this additional consumption will have negative implications for the natural environment.  How twisted are we!

Such a worry about consumption and economic growth is not new.  In graduate school, I learnt about the Club of Rome's Limits to Growth.  This report came out when I had barely started elementary school!  Almost 50 years later, we continue to worry about the consequences of growth and consumption.

Could it be different this time?

Now the focus has turned from scarcity to excess—specifically, of carbon dioxide in the air. In the past 50 years the burning of fossil fuels has more than doubled its concentration, accelerating global warming with its potentially calamitous consequences.

Levels of CO2 in the atmosphere 50 years ago versus now should truly worry all of us.  The industry, increasingly because of consumer feedback, and despite the maniacal and wrong-headed tRump and his toadies, is actively reducing its environmental impacts.

Fearing a backlash from eco-conscious consumers, firms are striving to lower their carbon intensity. So long as this brings down costs, CEOs happily oblige and society reaps the benefits of higher efficiency and better resource allocation. But if that leads to higher sales, companies’ overall environmental impact may rise.

What can be done then?

They should not be shamed—or required to urge customers to buy less of their wares, as some activists who glued themselves to corporate headquarters in London seem to demand. Governments can make citizens want less by making consumption pricier, with carbon taxes or other regulations. Until they do, firms will try to sell more stuff—because most people want more of it.

Yep, even most of us environmentalists want more stuff--we are addicted to stuff.  Getting rid of this addiction is impossible.  Well, an individual could, but most of us cannot.  Reducing consumption is, therefore, not in the mix of actions that we would like.  Which means, are we looking at an impossible task of squaring the proverbial circle?

The devil wears Zara

As I was putting the clothes away, I noticed it.  I could see light through my trousers--the seat was frayed.

I rushed to the closet and checked the other two pairs that are for my daily wear.  One looked ok enough.  The other had the telltale signs of a frayed bottom.

Back in the old country, that is how we wore clothes--until they were frayed.  I remember my grandmother joking about one of those shorts that I had worn out: "துணிய கிழிக்க சந்துல ஆணி இருக்கா?" (Do you have nails in your butt to tear the cloth?)

If I am comfy in them, why toss them away, right?

But, unlike my childhood, I now have way more clothes than I could ever need. Work clothes. Casual clothes. Shirts. Tshirts. Sweaters. Fleece.

And I am not even trying to keep up with the fashion trends. Some of my clothes are more than a decade old!  One can easily imagine the nightmare if I even remotely kept pace with what is current!

The pace at which clothes go out of style should worry us.  Leave along the mental health of the fashion-conscious. (Did you look at any of the photos of iVanka when her ultra-stylish outfit malfunctioned?)  Fast fashion messes up the life of workers in the industry, and is also an environmental nightmare:

In “Fashionopolis,” Dana Thomas, a veteran style writer, convincingly connects our fast-fashion wardrobes to global economic and climate patterns and crises, rooting the current state of the fashion biosphere as a whole — production methods, labor practices and environmental impacts — in the history of the garment industry.

Instead of looking into such issues big and small, morons and their moronic leaders instead believe that population growth is the greatest threat to sustainability, and that abortion is therefore critical for controlling population growth in poorer countries!

The industry manipulates us, and we consumers eagerly and merrily respond:

Fashionopolis lays blame squarely at the industry's door. At no point does Thomas shame consumers. But she does ask us to change our ways. As a nation, she writes, Americans sent 14 million tons of clothing to landfills in 2018, while shopping at a feverish pace. This "fashion bulimia" is enabled by fast fashion companies. In turn, it encourages their social and environmental malpractice.

If this is what being "developed" means!

The problem looks to worsen than ever before. It is on an Amazon scale now.  I mean, literally.

Amazon introduced in June 2018 a gadget called Echo Look: a hands-free camera and artificial intelligence personal stylist, retailing for $199. It’s like having your own Mews sales assistant, but at home. Echo Look connects to Amazon’s virtual assistant, Alexa; takes full- length pictures or six-second videos of you in your clothes; and builds a library of looks, which you can sort by season, style, color, or dressiness. The Style Check feature compares images of you in different outfits— like those “Who Wore It Better” magazine features— and tells you, on the screen, with the side‑by‑side shots, what’s working, and what’s not, sans the snark. “Fit looks better.” “The shape of the outfit works better.” “Colors look better on you.”

With my height and build, and with a balding head and grey hair, and a face that can't ever smile, I know well that clothes don't make a man.  We are ugly, and we are proud!  Maybe I should consider moving to Germany

One consumer at a time is the wrong approach

Welcome to today's episode of "If only people listened to me!"

For years, I have been ranting writing and saying that mantras like "recycle" or "become a vegetarian" is nothing but individuals feeling good about how they are helping the natural environment, but is really nothing more than, well, like peeing on oneself on a cold night to feel warm for a couple of seconds!

And this rant is from a nature-loving (mostly) vegetarian who is conscientious about his trash and recycling.

The rant against feel-goodism is because it means that "we have accepted individual responsibility for a problem we have little control over."  We consumers have been brainwashed into believing that we created these problems and that we can solve these ourselves, if only we behaved "correctly" in our homes.

Awful bullshit that is.

And that's what this review of  Inconspicious Consumption: The Environmental Impacts You Don’t Know You Have points out about the book's message:

[Tatiana] Schlossberg says, “it is not the fault of the consumer that cashmere is cheap, and it’s not wrong to want nice things or to buy them, sometimes. ... It’s not within your control how some company sources and produces its cashmere, or the size of the herd that they got it from. That should be the corporation’s burden … or governments should make sure they act responsibly.”

Like I said earlier, welcome to today's edition of "If only people listened to me!"

So, does it mean that we individuals cannot do any damn thing?  We merely come up with ideas like Extended Producer Responsibility and circular economy that seemingly go nowhere?

Well, yes, as individuals who recycle and reduce trash while being a vegetarian, we are powerless.  But, get a few of us together and ...

Governments and corporations, of course, don’t do such things automatically — they need citizens to push them. But it doesn’t require every citizen to push in order to make change (since apathy cuts both ways, social scientists estimate that getting 3 or 4 percent of people involved in a movement is often enough to force systemic change, whereas if they acted solely as consumers that same number would have relatively little effect). You can obviously do both, and all of us should try — but fighting for the Green New Deal makes more mathematical sense than trying to take on the planet one commodity at a time.

You want an example?  I can give you plenty from my own blog.  But then who cares for sriram's rants, right?  Here's from the review:

[Instead] of trying to figure out every single aspect of our lives, a carbon tax would have the effect of informing every one of those decisions, automatically and invisibly. The fuel efficiency standards that the Obama administration put forward and Trump is now gutting would result in stunningly different outcomes. And so on.

In a democracy (call it a republic if you are one of those rightwing nutcases!) we collectively deal with these issues via elections and the government.

We aren’t going to solve our problems one consumer at a time. We’re going to need to do it as societies and civilizations, or not at all.

Elections have consequences, as 63 million people reminded us!

BTW, who is the reviewer, you ask?  None other than Bill McKibben.  

I want to say one word to you. Just one word

You guessed that word: Plastics.

Fifty years after that famous scene, plastics are now only a tad more popular than trump!

What happened?

First, just because of the backlash against plastics, do not assume that they are unimportant.

You might be surprised to learn, for instance, that today’s cars and planes are, by volume, about 50% plastic. More clothing is made out of polyester and nylon, both plastics, than cotton or wool. Plastic is also used in minute quantities as an adhesive to seal the vast majority of the 60bn teabags used in Britain each year.
Add this to the more obvious expanse of toys, household bric-a-brac and consumer packaging, and the extent of plastic’s empire becomes clear. It is the colourful yet banal background material of modern life. Each year, the world produces around 340m tonnes of the stuff, enough to fill every skyscraper in New York City. Humankind has produced unfathomable quantities of plastic for decades, first passing the 100m tonne mark in the early 1990s. But for some reason it is only very recently that people have really begun to care.

What a revolution it was!  Once gadgets started appearing at home, plastic was everywhere.  In the "mixie" and the "grinder."  Women felt some relief, if not liberated, from their kitchen chores. Television. Phone.  Fridge. ...

Despite all that the plastics have done for us, we now hate plastic!

The United Nations has declared a “war” on single-use plastic. In Britain, Theresa May has called it a “scourge”, and committed the government to a 25-year plan that would phase out disposable packaging by 2042. India claimed it would do the same, but by 2022.

Yep, it is now a war on plastic!

An uncomfortable truth in this war?

To take on plastic is in some way to take on consumerism itself. It requires us to recognise just how radically our way of life has reshaped the planet in the span of a single lifetime, and ask whether it is too much.

Our consumer culture has been made possible by plastic.  Plastic is not the problem, but is a symptom.  Our consumerism is the real problem.

Is plastic the biggest issue?  Nope. I would claim that climate change is a way bigger threat.  So, why so much of attention on plastics?

unlike climate change, which seems vague, vast, and apocalyptic, plastic is smaller, more tangible, it is in your life right now. “The public doesn’t make these fine calculations – this is X times worse than that,” says Tom Burke, a former director of Friends of the Earth. “A moment crystallises and people see that other people feel the same way they do about an issue, then you get a push. People just want things fixed.” Or, as Christian Dunn, a fast-talking ecology lecturer from the University of Bangor, who has spent the past year helping to turn his hometown of Chester into one of Britain’s most anti-plastic cities, put it: “It’s something we can just get on with.”

The manner in which we people establish priorities is strange!

But, there is some good coming out of this war on plastic:

Our obsession with plastic has registered. In the much larger battle over climate change, the plastic backlash could end up being a small but energising victory, a model for future action.
This means facing up to how interconnected the problems are: to recognise that plastic isn’t just an isolated problem that we can banish from our lives, but simply the most visible product of our past half-century of rampant consumption. Despite the immensity of the challenge, when I spoke to Richard Thompson, the oceanographer who coined the term microplastic, he was upbeat. “At no time in the past 30 years have we had a convergence like this, with scientists, business, and government,” he said. “There’s a real chance to get this thing right.”

At least we can feel good about ourselves for launching this war.

"If everyone does a little, we’ll only achieve a little"

I drive a gasoline-powered car.
I fly--domestic and international.
I live in a house that is way big for one person.
I eat almonds from California.
These past few days, I have been cranking up the air-conditioning.

And, oh, I don't use plastic drinking straws, and I recycle paper, bottle, and plastic.

Can you tell me again why recycling and staying away from straws makes me an environmentalist, when my carbon footprint in everything else that I do is humongous?

For years, I have been complaining that we are not pursuing the big-impact issues, and are instead doing merely feel-good things. Like banning plastic straws and plastic bags.  I don't mean to suggest that banning these is a bad idea.  They are much needed.  But, it also does a huge disservice by making people think that banning straws and plastic bags is all that is needed.

If we want to educate conscientious environmental consumers, we should be honest about the scale of the problems and the results of our actions.

Exactly!

We should also remind people that this is a large-scale issue, and pointing fingers at individuals is ineffective.

Effectively, we have accepted individual responsibility for a problem we have little control over. We can swim against this plastic stream with all our might and fail to make much headway. At some point we need to address the source.

On top of that, a much bigger problem:

If environmentalism becomes about vilifying so many of life’s small pleasures and conveniences, I fear it will turn off more people than it rallies to its cause.

Like a neighbor who thinks that being environmental means to walk around with a stink--from not taking showers--and to wear dirty rags.

So, what should be done?

For starters, don't be a dick and blame population growth.  That is atrocious!  Our consumption patterns are the problem, not the numbers of humans born every year.

Go after the producers:

the best way to accelerate significant environmental progress might be to worry less about individual consumption and more about the production side of the equation.

Of course, this is increasingly difficult in this trump era; those in power now and the pro-business maniacs think that every shit that any business does is gold, and that those of us who worry about the long-term impacts on the natural environment are nothing but socialist snowflakes!

Elections have consequences, which the Berniacs did not think through when they went on a hate-Hillary campaign!

We are less than 100 days away from the next major election.  Do whatever you can to vote out these irresponsible scumbags who are robbing from the grandchildren.



ps: The title for this post was a quote in the essay that I have referred to.

Stop blaming consumers for our plastic crisis

My city is one of the many all across the country that are struggling to reconfigure the recycling collection, now that China has given us the much-needed kick in the rear end.  I am surprised that China took our crap--often the literal crap too--for this long, which allowed consumers in the US to waste without care.

But, it is not as if conscientiously recycling waste will clean up the air, water, and soil, and remake this the garden of Eden.

Recycling plastic is to saving the Earth what hammering a nail is to halting a falling skyscraper.

It makes us feel good, for sure.  But, if feelings alone can make wonders, then ...

Encouraging individuals to recycle more will never solve the problem of a massive production of single-use plastic that should have been avoided in the first place.

Aren't the manufacturers held accountable for this?  Right?  But we forget that over the years we people have put business and profits well ahead of anything in life.  We don't care a shit about anything else.

I want to proceed further only after reminding ourselves that the economics related to the use of plastics is highly complex.  It will boggle one's mind when we look at the different ways plastic makes our lives better.  The core problem is one of consumption; plastics is merely a symptom. But, recognizing that we are not going back to the caves, we ought to think about the downsides of plastic.

In dealing with the downside, instead of the problem being tackled at the source, the industry has successfully managed "to shift the onus of environmental responsibility onto the public."  There is "almost no responsibility on plastic manufacturers for the numerous environmental, economic and health hazards imposed by their products."

It is like with the fossil fuel industry too.  The older I get the less I understand why we call all these "progress"!

So, what does this public responsibility for the private crapping mean?

Effectively, we have accepted individual responsibility for a problem we have little control over. We can swim against this plastic stream with all our might and fail to make much headway. At some point we need to address the source.

We need to face up to the reality:

Our huge problem with plastic is the result of a permissive legal framework that has allowed the uncontrolled rise of plastic pollution, despite clear evidence of the harm it causes to local communities and the world’s oceans. Recycling is also too hard in most parts of the U.S. and lacks the proper incentives to make it work well.

This means that we need to address the problem right at the source.  Easier said than done, right?

Actually, it can be done.  Like how more and more restaurants are banning plastic straws, or provide them only upon request.

A small tweak like this can lead to huge changes in consumer behavior, by making wastefulness an active choice rather than the status quo. Such measures were recently adopted by several U.S. cities, and are under consideration in California and the U.K.

Notice that such approaches go beyond individual consumers.

A better alternative is the circular economy model, where waste is minimized by planning in advance how materials can be reused and recycled at a product’s end of life rather than trying to figure that out after the fact. To make this happen, we can support groups like the Ellen MacArthur Foundation that are partnering with industry to incorporate “cradle-to-cradle” (i.e., circular economic) design into their products.

So, think about what you want to do in this project in order to mobilize people.

Start conversations with your family members and friends. Call your local and federal representatives to support bottle bills, plastic bag taxes and increased producer responsibility for reuse and recycling. Stand up against preemptive bans on local plastic regulation. There are signs that corporations are listening to consumer opinions, too.

Imagining such possibilities in the trump era, which was made possible by 63 million, might be rather difficult.  But, the alternative is worse.

A fruit for all seasons?

I didn't taste my first strawberry until I came to America.

That should not surprise anybody.  I grew up in a HOT near-equatorial place.  The fruits that I ate were bananas and mangoes and guavas and jackfruits.  On the other hand, an overwhelming majority of Americans would not have even heard of something called a jackfruit, leave alone tasting the awesome fruit or the sweet that mothers made.

Living a locavore life is what we humans did until very, very, recently.  In contrast to all our collective history, grocery stores now seem to sell fruits and vegetables that I hadn't even heard of.  I am yet to try out many strange looking produce items that are on the shelves in my grocery store simply because I have no idea what to do with them, nor do I have the remotest idea of how they might taste.

Strawberries I came to appreciate.  The sweet/tart taste with vanilla ice cream, for instance, is heavenly on a hot summer afternoon.  But then, slowly as I learnt more about the fruit, the more I started getting concerned about the labor used, and the pesticides and other chemicals, the less I became fascinated with strawberries.

After the move to Oregon, in one of my classes, a student remarked that it is easy to distinguish between strawberries from California versus the Oregon produce.  The ones from California are bloated, full of water, and tasteless, he swore.

I started paying attention. He was correct.

Over the past few years, I have been thinking more and more about the fact that the stores always have most fruits and vegetables, as if there is no seasonality/  Especially strawberries.

Today’s California strawberry industry, which grows 88 percent of US strawberries, was born in the 1860s in the Pajaro Valley, straddling Santa Cruz and Monterey counties.7 There, apple orchardists experimented with planting strawberries in the rows between trees. Once they began shipping the fruit to San Francisco markets, they found strawberries to be quite lucrative.8 Land in the Pajaro Valley was ideal for strawberry production, especially in the alluvial plains where the rivers meet the seas. The sandy loam soils drained well to prevent the build-up of moisture and salt and protect a fruit that is prone to rot.9 The Mediterranean climate was no less accommodating. With the vast majority of rain falling between November and April, the warm and dry temperatures of summer protected against molds and other moisture-generated pests and diseases during the harvest season. The natural air conditioning of the Pacific Ocean was an additional advantage, in the summer bringing cool, moist air into the low-lying coastal areas, while in the wintertime keeping frosts at bay. The benefits of what some call the “eternal spring” included a long harvest season, eventually inducing breeders to develop varietals that could be harvested nearly year-round.

The strawberry story is a complex one.  As demand grew, the use of various chemicals dramatically increased.  Now, we are wiser.  In a tight regulatory framework, strawberries present us with a wonderful example of the urgency to think about sustainability--to grow the fruit in plenty, with as little environmental impacts as possible, and while treating the labor fairly.

the strawberry case illustrates that sustainability itself is not a singular goal that can be achieved all at once. Instead, striving for sustainability in agriculture presents inescapable trade-offs in the use of resources and materials, not to mention social goals around working conditions, farmer livelihoods, and affordability. It’s time we started having a public conversation about the fact that those trade-offs exist and how we want to navigate them.

I, for one, have pretty much stopped buying strawberries from the stores.

Rights and wrongs

Way back, when I was a kid who had barely gotten on to the bicycling phase, I complained to my father that our home was far away from where my friends lived.  He said that the industrial township was intentionally designed that way--with lots of open space and trees--in order to make sure that the health impacts from the open-pit (strip) mining would be minimal.

Fast forward a few decades.  We had a thirtieth high school reunion.  After the excitement died down, we middle-aged classmates even talked about our health issues, and our parents' health.  One classmate was convinced that his father's neurological disease was from the daily exposure to toxic chemicals at the fertilizer factory.  His father's health conditions were nightmarish, of an active brain trapped in an immobile body.

My slightly asthmatic hassles were what I brought to the discussion.  I added that my parents and siblings too had--and have--allergy issues that then complicate the nose, throat, lungs functioning.  A friend quickly jumped in at that point, with a forceful comment that most of us who lived there have those very issues and that, yes, the industrial air was the cause.

Of course, establishing the cause-and-effect is not easy, especially when it comes to geographic clusters of ill-health.  But, think about it: Extensive mining, where the topsoil and the layers underneath are stripped generating whatever into the atmosphere.  Then there are the byproducts of the factories.  There is enough and more to hypothesize, right?  I suppose I should be happy that the township was at least well spread out.

It is a strange "development" model that we have put into place over the past two hundred years.  We destroy the natural environment in order to do everything from making smartphones and tshirts and whatever.

The right to pursue happiness is one thing, but don't we have a more fundamental right to clean air, clean water, a clean environment?

The idea of environmental human rights is receiving growing attention worldwide, driven by our global ecological crisis.

I worry that this is coming a tad too late.  A couple of years ago, I went to India's IT capital to meet with a few friends, including this guy.  I was shocked at how warm and dry and brown it was, in contrast to my trip there when I was wrapping up high school.  My father routinely updates me that wells in my grandmother's village have gone dry.  Every visit, I am shocked by how polluted the city is.

I wish we talked more and often about environmental human rights:

The idea of environmental human rights dates back to the environmental movement of the 1960s and 1970s. It follows other, more established conceptions of human rights, such as civil and political rights and economic, social and cultural rights, and often is classified as part of a so-called third generation of “newer” human rights.
Few international agreements explicitly refer to environmental human rights. At the national level, however, more than 100 countries around the world have constitutions that enshrine environmental rights to some degree, including Brazil and Kenya.
Only a handful of U.S. states, including Pennsylvania and Hawaii, have constitutions that explicitly incorporate environmental rights. What is more, these provisions were largely established decades ago and have had uneven success in their enforcement.

With this president and his secretaries for the natural environments (EPA and Interior) we are well on our way to making things even worse.

Africa? My ass!

I am no Chinese expert.  Heck, am not an expert on anything,  but that has never stopped me from commenting.  It has worked out well all these years; so, why stop now, right?

Of course I have been fascinated with China forever.  Don't forget that I was a commie sympathizer even before I got my first pimple.  I hated how the pimples always appeared in the most obvious places on my face--on my nose, and the center of my forehead.  Yet, I hated the damn British bastards more than how much I hated those damn pimples!

It was only after I started understanding how much the communist systems in China and the USSR were messing around with people, that I started questioning my belief that the commies were the good guys.  As the years rolled on, I could not be bothered with that political economic system, and I decided that America was going to be my home, as imperfect as it was/is.

Now, I detest any system where the party decides the fates of its peoples, and a system where people aren't free.  But, that is their problem, I suppose.

However, when China begins to flex its muscles around the world, it becomes my problem too!

The NY Times editorializes about China's trillion dollar foreign policy, and notes there:

Whatever the economic benefits, a project cannot be allowed to run roughshod over individuals or trample on the environment. Mr. Xi stressed that consultation, transparency and people’s “well-being” are vital, but China’s track record is not encouraging. One example: Kyaukphyu, Myanmar, where a Chinese-Myanmar oil and gas pipeline was pursued in secret, stomped on farmers’ property rights and did significant environmental damage.
China clearly aims to dominate the international system. If it succeeds — shaping how vast sums are spent and where, and which laws are followed or not — it could upend a system established by Washington and its allies after World War II. And there are military concerns: For instance, many Burmese and foreign experts worry that China could use the Kyaukphyu ports for military purposes.

But, China's economic development is built on that model--to "run roughshod over individuals or trample on the environment." The party has merely gone international with its domestic approach.

This approach when taken to countries that are poor and when they have no power to stand up can then result in awful stories like this--Africa's donkeys are being killed in huge numbers:

Donkeys are being slaughtered at an alarming pace to feed a global trade in donkey hides that’s fueled by soaring demand in China, where the skins are used to manufacture a gelatin believed to have anti-ageing and libido-enhancing properties.

I care not about crazy beliefs in anti-ageing and in libido properties.  But, I care about the poor farmers being messed up.  "Niger halted exports of the animal and completely prohibited their slaughtering,"

Mali, Senegal and Gambia followed suit. Zimbabwe, where donkeys are less common, turned down an application to build a donkey slaughterhouse, while Ethiopia closed its only functioning donkey abattoir after residents complained about the stench and pollution.
But large-scale slaughtering continues in many African countries, including Tanzania, Ghana and Kenya, and online sales ads for donkey hides are especially easy to find in Nigeria.”

And, yes, the donkeys are the latest to suffer from this Chinese demand:

Like the poaching of Africa’s rhinos and elephants, and deforestation caused by the largely illicit trade in rosewood timber, the slaughter of donkeys is an unforeseen consequence of rising Chinese incomes and an expanding middle class.

Can't the party strike a balance between its old Mao days and such an approach to "run roughshod over individuals or trample on the environment"?

Never enough?

Years ago, soon after Amazon released the Kindle, my daughter bought me one.  And later, she was surprised that I was not using that gadget.  I tried my best to explain to her that I am not into gadgets just because they are new and fancy.

Now, it does not mean that I am not a consumer.  I am one hell of a consumer.  A wasteful consumer as much as anybody else.

much of the world’s waste is a product of habitual practices we think normal: driving a car, yes, but taking a daily shower, too, or heating our homes or changing our underpants daily (by 1986, 45 percent of German men did compared to the 5 percent who did in 1966). It has almost nothing to do with individual motives or morality.

I think of my own life, and can easily see how rapidly my consumption has increased.  Take, for instance, clothes.  Back when I was a kid, all my clothes could have been packed into a small carry-on.  Come to think of it, back then most of us kids did not even wear underwear.  I say this with confidence because one of the punishments at school was to stand up on the bench.

One of the old jokes related to this punishment is this:
The teacher asks, "where is Kenya?"
The student has no clue.
The teacher tells the student to stand on the bench.
The smartass student then asks, "if I stand up on the bench, will I be able to see Kenya?"

It was a public shaming--the one standing up on the bench did something wrong according to the teacher and now the entire class and anybody who passed by is made aware as well.  We would giggle at being able to see the bat and balls, if you know what I mean, of the one standing adjacent to us.  Chances are that, now, no urban first grader boy in India ever goes to school without underwear on.  A small change in daily life, but that is an example of daily life consumption, right?

Unlike my six-year old self, whose clothes could be packed into one small carry-on, I will now need a few boxes to pack all my clothes.  And then the footwear!  I have three pairs of work shoes, two pairs of sneakers, two pairs of sandals--in contrast to one pair of slippers (flipflops) and a pair of shoes that I wore to school when I was a kid.  What I had as a kid was itself a great deal more than what my father had--he got his first pair of footwear only when he got to the "First Form"--sixth grade, I think it means.  Until he was eleven or twelve, father went about barefoot like almost everybody else.

My point is that my not having a Kindle or an iPad or whatever does not make me any holier.

From a larger perspective, we need to understand this--it is not anything "American":

Trentmann demonstrates that by the twentieth century, states of many kinds—not just the liberal democracies—regarded consumption as indispensable. Countries such as Britain and the United States set the model: there, the link between the citizen and the consumer was forged tightly. At the heart of the New Deal were ideals of freedom and plenty, understood as mutually reinforcing propositions. But Trentmann seeks to extend the point more broadly, to demonstrate that freedom was hardly necessary to a thriving consumer society. Nazi Germany, for instance, sought to deliver the goods or, failing that, to promise their appearance; German factories continued producing toys and cosmetics until the defeat at Stalingrad. With its canny embrace of consumption, the contemporary Chinese state furnishes another good example. Starting in the late 1990s, China created “a nation of property owners” in less than a decade, a feat that outstrips the record of Herbert Hoover and Margaret Thatcher, the Anglo-American “champions of home-owning democracy.”

I consume, therefore I am!  One of the paradoxes of economic transformation from the old agrarian past.

I am concerned about the rainforest ... from the comforts of my home?

I have always been highly skeptical of economic growth and development that destroys the natural environment in the name of progress.  It was one of the many, many reasons that I could not understand what it was that I was going to contribute via engineering.  In those primitive days before the internet and television, The Hindu's reports on a guy named Sunderlal Bahuguna and the Chipko Movement fascinated me.  Yet, I was not completely sold on tree-hugging either.

Even early in graduate school, I met students who were committed to the environmental cause.  To many of them, it was not Bahuguna and the Chipko Movement, but it was Chico Mendes and his work to save the Amazon rainforest.  His assassination made a huge impact on many of my graduate-school-mates.  But, unlike this guy, for instance, I could not get myself to thinking and working only on the issue of natural environment, even though by then it was clear to me that professional advancement would not happen if I continued to spread my interests instead of focusing on one big thing.

It has always impressed me, however, that activists like Mendes completely dedicate themselves to the effort even when fully aware that their lives might get terminated by unscrupulous characters who take law into their own hands.  That level of commitment is phenomenal.

In India, Bahuguna has been honored for his work, with awards including India's second highest civilian honor.  The story of environmental activists in South America, of all the continents, continues to be violent.

2015 had the highest conservation-related mortality rates since 2010, with 185 confirmed cases (143 were reported for 2012 and 130 for 2011). In a previous study with data from 2014 Global Witness had counted 116 deaths, which implies a significant growth from one year to the next.
...
Latin America had the dubious honor of being the region with the highest number of conservationist murders—122; Brazil took the lion’s share with 50 killings. The investigation found that conflicts mostly involved mining (42 cases), agrobusiness (20), logging (15) and hydroelectric projects (15).

Killed, just like Mendes was, only because they were in the way of people who wanted to make money out of the natural environment.  How tragic!

Of course, the government and corporate agents are corrupt as hell and work closely with the killers!

The clash between the different viewpoints on how to achieve development is more often than not resolved with violence. Global Witness warns that just a few cases result in the filing of a formal complaint that leaves a documented record. Even less frequent are cases resulting in a conviction. According to the NGO, impunity ends up benefiting not only the perpetrator of the crime but also the mastermind behind it, who can have a relationship with the upper levels of the economic and political powers.

It is easy to point fingers at corrupt politicians and businesses.  What is more difficult is for individual consumers, like me, to understand that it is pressure from us that businesses are also responding to.  We consumers want the next best thing and at the lowest possible price.  The killings are the hidden costs.  The irreplaceable destruction is a hidden cost.  Or, even if they are in plain sight, we choose to look away, or be in complete denial.  Taking care of the natural environment requires us to practice what we preach--which is one of the reasons I knew I could not ever completely dedicate myself to the cause without being a hypocrite.  I would rather accept my flaws and try to understand the big picture and spread the word.

I also know I owe the Mendeses of the world a huge thanks.  I feel so small compared to them.

So, what's your beef with climate change??

Over the years, I have blogged in plenty (like here) about the environmental impacts of the foods that we eat.  I have even made fun of ardent environmentalists who are not vegetarians, because of the huge environmental footprint meat has.  As if I needed more, the Economist provides this:

Overall the livestock sector accounts for between 8% and 18% of global emissions—about as much pollution as comes out the tailpipes of the world’s cars. Ruminant livestock, such as cattle and sheep, have stomachs containing bacteria able to digest tough, cellulose-rich plants. But along the way, huge volumes of gases are farted and belched too. The UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation estimates that the world’s domesticated ruminants annually release 100m tonnes of methane—a greenhouse gas 25 times more powerful than carbon dioxide.

So, what can a typical consumer do?  More research findings, please:

 A recent study also published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences calculated the benefits of low-meat and no-meat diets using computer models through to 2050. The former daily regime included eating five portions of fruits and vegetables, less than 50g of sugar, up to 43g of red meat and a total energy content of between 2,200-2,300 calories. A vegetarian diet and a vegan diet were also analysed.

 How do you think the vegetarian and vegan diets compared with the "non-veg" habits, with respect to GHG emissions?  You need to think big numbers. I mean, big:

Following a modest meat diet, global greenhouse gas emissions were found only to increase 7% by 2050 (compared with an expected increase of 51% according to projections from the status quo). A widespread switch to vegetarianism could curb emissions by nearly two thirds and veganism by 70%.

Reduce emissions by two-thirds should be a great selling point, right?  Add to the GHG reductions the health benefits from not eating red meat or the "other white meat."  And then overlay the bypassing of the ethical issues about how we kill animals, especially the low-footprint chicken.  Going vegetarian is a win-win-win all the way around, right?

Which is why I, too, am puzzled that "People Still Don't Get the Link between Meat Consumption and Climate Change"

People who already eat less meat may be more open to hear and retain information on the climate impacts of meat, while people who eat lots of meat may be more inclined to deny or downplay it. That is, behaviors may inform knowledge as much as knowledge informs behavior. And as many studies have shown, although knowledge is an important aspect of behavioral change, it alone is rarely enough for people to change their lifestyles. Changing behaviors as intimate and culturally engrained as people’s daily dietary habits therefore demands a careful consideration of the psychological and cultural dynamics at play.

So, what can be done?

the greatest potential for a shift towards sustainable lifestyles is through a change in culture and worldview—a shift in assumptions about human nature, our relationship with the (natural) world around us, and our aspirations for the ‘good life’. Food touches on social habits and norms; plays a role in mediating power and status; is often key to social participation and acceptance; and is expressive of collective values and identity. Consumption and lifestyles therefore tend to be shaped more by people collectively than individually. The most effective strategies thus engage people in groups, and give them opportunities to develop their understanding and narratives about food in dialog together.

Tough luck, given that the youth in even the traditionally vegetarian culture is rapidly taking up serious meat eating!

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Your cheatin heart ... is NOxious

It turns out that the "business ethics" of Volkswagen has been educational about yet another oxymoron: "clean diesel."  For that enlightenment, we need to thank the lying, cheating, professionals at the company that Hitler was so excited about ;)

Volkswagen's atrocious business practice might have been merely about selling cars. but that affected way more than customers' wallets alone:

Volkswagen played a leading role in convincing people to accept a technology that in many countries is causing a precipitous decline in air quality for millions of city-dwellers: the diesel engine. Monitoring sites in European cities like London, Stuttgart, Munich, Paris, Milan and Rome have reported high levels of the nitrogen oxides and particulate matter, or soot, that help to create menacing smogs.

You see, diesel is not really "clean"--something we ought to have known on our own!

Diesel exhaust is laden with insidious soot particles, the so-called PM 2.5 (particulate matter smaller than 2.5 microns, or one-thirtieth the width of a human hair), which allow carcinogens to penetrate deep into tissues and organs. In other words, a driver who steps on the accelerator of a diesel car may be filling the lungs of nearby pedestrians, cyclists, infants in strollers and other drivers with potentially deadly particulate matter.

The price we are willing to pay for material progress!

It does seem like diesel for cars is now, ahem, exhausted ;)

Diesel trucks and large passenger cars, with their relatively clean exhausts, will doubtless soldier on. But who needs a small diesel? In terms of fuel economy, small turbo-charged petrol engines have all but caught up. The diesel version of the Chevrolet Cruze, for instance, gets 33mpg on the EPA's combined cycle, while the thriftiest petrol version of the same car gets 30mpg—and is a whopping $2,400 cheaper. The small, frugal diesel—upon which Volkswagen placed so much of its hopes for a future of green motoring—looks to have been left for dead by the roadside.

As with everything else, and even though the ethics of customers is no better, a better future depends on we the people:

In the end it may be up to consumers to force change. After all, while climate change caused by carbon dioxide is a somewhat abstract concept, the choking effect of NOx emissions is not just in front of but in their very eyes.

Or, we can always choke ourselves to death, like they do in Delhi even now :(

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Neither god nor capitalism works in mysterious ways!

The hippie, er, Pope, is on a tear talking up the environment and criticizing capitalism, which will certainly make the right-wing Catholics wonder if Francis is some kind of a Manchurian Candidate ;)  One of the problems I have with the faith-based people, which includes not only the religious but also those who make religions of their favorite causes, is that they often tend to obfuscate facts or even try to hide them.  Ricardo Hausman goes after the Pope with facts.  But, first, what was the Holy See's problem with capitalism?

Pope Francis said in a recent speech in Bolivia: “This system is by now intolerable: farm workers find it intolerable, laborers find it intolerable, communities find it intolerable, peoples find it intolerable. The earth itself – our sister, Mother Earth, as Saint Francis would say – also finds it intolerable.”

Typically, this is what happens when preaching to the choir--there is no dissent. The audience, in fact, leaves even more strengthened in their "faith," which in this case is that all the problems of this world can be attributed to capitalism.

Except for an inconvenient truth--our lives have become way more tolerable than conditions have ever been only thanks to capitalism.  If the Industrial Revolution marks as an easy to reference starting point for the economic system that we now practice, all one has to do is think about life as it was prior to that time period.  How many among us would want to live in the conditions that existed, say, 300 years ago?  (The Pope would, I am sure, because the Vatican was immensely more powerful and influential back then!)

Hausman writes:

In poverty-stricken Bolivia, Francis criticized “the mentality of profit at any price, with no concern for social exclusion or the destruction of nature,” along with “a crude and naive trust in the goodness of those wielding economic power and in the sacralized workings of the prevailing economic system.”...
Francis is right to focus attention on the plight of the world’s poorest. Their misery, however, is not the consequence of unbridled capitalism, but of a capitalism that has been bridled in just the wrong way. 

I am no rah-rah fan of capitalism, as the regular readers know all too well.  But then there is no way I will engage in a rhetorical wholesale condemnation either.  Because, there are far too many nuances to think about.  Consider one of the many sweeping accusations of "profit at any price."  Of course, there are atrocious practices like pollution or ill-treatment of the workers, primarily thanks to how those with money are able to rope the government in and get away with such crimes.  But, there is also the other side of the same system that encourages investments even when they do not generate big time profits at all.

You are perhaps thinking that it is so un-capitalistic for the system to voluntarily support when we think it is always "profit at any price."  James Surowiecki writes about " two common but ultimately questionable assumptions":

 The first is that corporate decision-makers care only about the short term. The second is that it’s the stock market that makes them think this way.

Quick. Can you think about capitalistic behavior that has resulted in strong support for companies that don't seem to generate profits?  Stumped?

Of course, there’s no shortage of investors who are myopic. But the market, for the most part, isn’t. That’s why companies like Amazon and Tesla and Netflix, whose profits in the present have typically been a tiny fraction of their market caps, have been able to command colossal valuations. It’s why there’s a steady flow of I.P.O.s for companies with small revenues and nonexistent earnings. And it’s why the biotech industry is now valued at more than a trillion dollars, even though many of the firms have yet to bring a single drug to market. None of these things are what you’d expect from a market dominated by short-term considerations.

Back when the Pope ruled the world, freedom was not known to most of the world, except for a tiny few who were the rich and the powerful.  It was a world of slavery and diseases and tortures and short-lives and poverty and starvation.  We have a lot more to do in order to address diseases and poverty and starvation and many more human sufferings.  But, no soaring rhetoric condemning capitalism will deliver any miracles, even if the faithful blindly believe in the power of miracles.

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No amount of gold can put Humpty Dumpty together again

Remember the Second Law of Thermodynamics from the high school days?  What? You forgot that already?  No way!

The next time you read about, or see something, which makes you comment along the lines of "the world is getting more and more chaotic," remind yourself about the second law of thermodynamics, according to which the amount of disorder in the universe will always increase.  Always.

Did that stir any memories of your high school science classes?  You recall that entropy is a measure of the level of disorder?  What? You forgot that already?  No way!

I have been thinking about the disorder and entropy a lot more after reading about two incidents, one here in the US and another in China.  Here, it was that awful accident that turned a river yellow; I am sure you saw plenty of photos of that.  And in China, it was the explosion at Tianjin.

These, like many events that unfold in life, are irreversible.  We can't undo them.  Once the egg falls and cracks, all the king's horses and all the king's men cannot put Humpty together again.  In irreversible processes, entropy always increases.

Mining is one of the best (worst?) examples of entropy, where we can also see that Humpty Dumpty cannot ever be put together again once we start digging down. The Animas River turning mustard yellow reminds us about one of those uncomfortable and inconvenient truths about mining:

The accident heightened a debate here over the future of this region’s old mines, and served as a reminder, some critics say, that the Gold King’s toxic demise could be repeated at any of thousands of abandoned mines around the country.

Source

We humans value gold, for reasons that are beyond my wildest imaginations.  Thus, we mine for it.

In its heyday, the Gold King produced about 350,000 ounces of high-grade gold, according to its current owner, and its products landed on the fingers of well-off women in New York City, in the pockets of everyday Americans and in the vaults of banks around the world.

So, what is the connection with the explosion at Tianjin?  Mining for gold.  Cyanide is the connection:

Alarming levels of sodium cyanide have been found at wastewater monitoring stations in the disaster-stricken city of Tianjin almost five days after a series of deadly explosions claimed at least 114 lives and sparked intense criticism of the Chinese government.

Source

How does cyanide connect Tianjin and the Animas River spill?  The spill was from an abandoned gold mine.  And one of the most common uses of sodium cyanide is in the mining of gold.

Most of the world’s gold is not found in nugget form but as very fine gold powders in rocks. In fact, our cultural demand for gold forces us to mine in rocks that can be as low as 0.005% gold. This means we need industrial extraction to separate and purify gold from all the other materials.
After mining and milling, the crude rock mixture is turned into a fine powder and added to a solution of sodium cyanide. The gold forms strong bonds with cyanide molecules and can then be separated from the rest of the minerals because it is then soluble in water. It then reacts with zinc and turns back into a solid. Finally is smelted to isolate the gold and cast into bars.

Mining for gold is perhaps one of the most toxic mining activities ever.  Is our madness for gold worth all this disorder?  I suppose we need to send people back to the science classes and not let them out unless and until they have understood the second law of thermodynamics and entropy!

Phones are newer and smarter ... this user is older and dumber!

I got into the smartphone habit much later than most in my circle.  I simply had no need for it--my old flip-phone worked fine.  My daughter was surprised; she thought I loved such gadgets.  I do.  But, when I evaluated the costs and the benefits, it just didn't seem worth it.

I finally made the switch to a smartphone.  I have now had that phone for a few years.  A couple of more generations of that phone have come and gone, but I am fine with what I have.  

In the US, most of us don't shell out the entire cost of a new smartphone.  Instead, we enter into a contract with a telephone company, which then provides the phone at a low price.  That remarkably low upfront cost makes the upgrades "easier" for customers.

With my contract, I was "eligible" for an upgrade a while ago.  I don't bother with that.  Because, I worry.  Unnecessary it might be; but, I worry.  Worry is all I seem to do, when I don't engage in sophomoric jokes ;)

The experience with the television set was tough enough.  I continued to soldier on with my cathode-ray-tube TV until the cable company's digital transmission started messing up things.  I then became the recipient of the daughter's gift!

I routinely force students to think about where their old smartphones end up when they upgrade to the latest gadget.  I have assigned essays, like this one, which then provide the context for them to pause for a few minutes and think about the resource consumption.  I practice--at least try to--what I teach.  Thus, I have a difficult time getting rid of my old smartphone even when it serves all my purposes. Last December, when I was taking photographs of the high school classmates who had come to the niece's wedding, one friend laughingly said "ever since the first time I reconnected with Sriram, he has been using the same camera."  Yes, it has been the same camera too for a few years now.  Just because it is old I should dump it?  I don't operate that way.  

I would suggest that you, too, think about those issues before you do whatever you do, especially if you are an environmental nutcase like me.  (Yes, shocking to you, eh, given my right-wing politics!)

It takes a lot of energy to use a smartphone. You charge the phone daily, you browse and exchange messages, you create tweets and Instagram posts that are saved on some faraway energy-guzzling server. Yet the biggest way to lessen the environmental impact of your phone doesn't have anything to do with how you use it, according to a new review

I have no idea why they had to do a big review to figure things out.  I have been saying the same stuff for years; oh yeah, nobody cares for what I have to say! ;)

All of that activity pales in comparison to how much energy it takes to extract and refine the dozens of precious metals that go into a smartphone. In other words, abstaining from replacing your smartphone more frequently than need be—and recycling it when you're done with it—may be the best way to make a difference.
"The current business model of mobile contracts encourages consumers to upgrade frequently, regardless of whether their current phone is fit for purpose," University of Surrey physicist James Suckling, one of the review's authors, said in a statement. "This isn't a trend that can continue if we are to have the mobile lifestyle we want, while still ensuring a sustainable future."

So, there!

I way prefer my clear approach to planned obsolescence ;)

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Foaming at the mouth

Don't worry, I am fine.  I am not foaming at the mouth.  At least, not yet!

Even students apparently know that; earlier today a student came by for a chat and said he is now too busy to read my blog posts every day.

I know what you are thinking: how can anybody be so busy that they can't read my blog, right? ;)

"Do you really have a quiet life in Eugene like you write in the blog?" he asked.

Life in the ashram is quiet and peaceful.  "Nobody to bug me, and I don't bug others" I replied.

So, foaming at the mouth is not me.  Certainly not this "steady Eddie" as the friend refers to me sometimes.

But, nature can sometimes foam at the mouth, it seems.  Photos of volcanic eruptions, like the latest one in Chile, certainly do feel like nature is furious.

And then there are times when we humans make nature foam.  Literally!

Caption at the source:
Froth from Varthur Lake spilled on the nearby road on Monday

That's no special effects, dear reader! :(

Like a washing machine that has had too much detergent put in it, Varthur lake – one of the largest lakes in the city – started to sprout out white froth, at least five feet high, on Monday.

 I wonder how far away from this lake is the residence of the debating partner.  Maybe he is foaming at the mouth after witnessing it in real time!

Environmentalist Yellappa Reddy said the froth was due to washing machine detergents, which flowed into the lake with the raw sewage let in. “These detergents have high concentration of phosphates, which leads to lowering of the biological oxygen demand and chemical oxygen demand of the lake. This will cause aquatic life in the lake to die slowly,” he said. An officer in the Karnataka State Pollution Control Board said the froth was formed due to the reaction of detergents and toilet cleaners with warm water.

How much environmental impacts will it take for people in the old country to metaphorically foam at the mouth and demand cleaner air, water, and land?  But then, perhaps they are happy with the Faustian Bargain of economic growth at any cost.