THE WORLD ENVIRONMENT DAY-2008

Today all over the world, the World Environment Day is being observed. This year’s slogan for the day, “Kick the habit! Towards a Low Carbon Economy” strongly urges every one of us to get rid of our bad habits of energy wastage in order to save our environment. Our habits do influence the world energy consumption, carbon emission and the consequent global warming and climate change. The penchant for using motor bikes or cars even for moving two or three kilometers, the belief that owning more number of cars or bikes is progress, and distaste for using public transportation are all bad habits and must be changed. Each one of us must resolve today to conserve energy, to reduce pollution, and to plant trees to make world greener. We must cultivate the habit of shutting of lights and fans when not needed, not keeping television, music systems or VCR on hold when not used, using more energy efficient CFL instead of ordinary incandescent lamps, using pressure cookers and smokeless ‘chulhas’ for cooking, and adopting solar powered lights, water heaters and cooking devices. In highly crowded cities, private vehicles should be discouraged and people should use public transportation.

The steep hikes in the prices of petrol, diesel and cooking gas declared by the government of India yesterday is only the tip of the iceberg. We must realize that the era of plentiful and cheap fossil fuels is almost over. In coming years we will face decreasing supplies and soaring prices world over for all fossil fuels. The only alternative is to shift to renewable energy sources like the sun, wind, ocean and hydrogen, which are also non-polluting, to run our civilization. Massive efforts are needed to develop technology to use these energy sources. Today let us hope that Nations of the World heed the warnings of environmental experts to take appropriate action so that our environment can be saved from destruction and preserved for posterity. Indeed, environmental protection is the defining issue of the era.

June 5, 2008