We are experiencing the future. The global average temperature over the past year has been 1.6°C higher than the pre-industrial average. June 2024 was the 13th consecutive month in which global average temperatures not just broke but shattered the record for the month. One factor is the recent El Niño, the periodic oceanic-atmospheric phenomenon that releases some of the massive heat stored in the oceans. However, the latest El Niño was nowhere as strong as the super El Niño of 2015–16, and yet the world is a lot warmer now.
This suggests that the underlying cause for the extreme heat is relentless global warming due to greenhouse gases emitted into the atmosphere, which trap heat equal to the energy of roughly nine Hiroshima bombs per second, or about 7,77,600 such bombs each day, year after year.
Also deeply concerning is that the planet has begun warming a lot faster since 2010, at a staggering rate of 0.32°C per decade: 80 per cent faster than the 0.18°C a decade over 1970–2010. This is likely caused by a decline in aerosols, tiny pollutants in the atmosphere that reflect the sun’s radiation and mask warming.
In India too, 2023 was the second warmest year in 122 years of recorded temperatures (after 2016), according to the India Meteorological Department. The heat was made worse in 2024 by very little snow in many Himalayan regions and little rain in the pre-monsoon period in many parts of the country. Consequently, millions of people, mostly workers, have suffered scorching daytime temperatures over an unusually long period. For instance, Delhi faced 38 consecutive days with temperatures above 40°C. This was worsened by high humidity and very high night-time temperatures (the minimum temperature in Delhi touched 33°C, more than the maximum temperature of many of the world’s cities).
The societal impacts of this, both direct and indirect, have been deeply unequal, ranging from deaths from heatstroke, hospitalisation, reduced ability to work, and frequent power cuts, to a decline in the production of key food crops such as wheat, and higher prices of vegetables, all of which have inordinately affected those least responsible for the problem.
State response
What has the state response been? The primary response of the Central and State governments to extreme heat stress events has been the creation and implementation of heat action plans (HAPs) at different levels of political units. It has been reported that HAPs are operational in 23 States and across 100 districts in the country.
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The key elements of HAPs and their implementation are as follows: One, activation of early warning systems based on five–day temperature predictions, and colour-coded alerts when temperatures cross three thresholds, typically, yellow at 41°C, orange at 43°C, and red at 45°C, though the thresholds may vary for different places. Two, building public awareness through radio, posters, pamphlets, and different media, including social media. Three, urban interventions such as enabling cool roofs with paints that reduce indoor temperatures by 3–4°C, and sending out mobile vans that distribute water-free. Four, public health interventions such as training medical personnel to recognise and treat patients with heatstroke (this year, a heat ward was set up at Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital in Delhi with iced water infrastructure that helps bring down body temperatures quickly).
As a consequence of all this, heat stress mortality in India has declined significantly, from a peak of around 2,000 deaths in 2015–16 to 189 confirmed deaths from heat stress in 2023, according to the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare. However, it is likely that mortality numbers from heatstroke are underestimated, given how these deaths are often recorded.
Much more is needed, and at many levels. In an analysis of 37 HAPs across 18 States in 2023, the Centre for Policy Research found that “nearly all HAPs are poor at identifying and targeting vulnerable groups”. As temperatures continue to rise and heatwaves last interminably, there is a need for local and detailed vulnerability mapping to enable a more targeted and prompt response. We also need a more granular estimation of temperature and humidity levels at which mortality and morbidity occur in different regions of the country. Heatwaves also need to be notified as a “disaster” under the Disaster Management Act, 2005, which would enable larger and more focussed funding.
Some other improvements need to be employment-specific. In conversation, senior trade union leaders said that factories and workplaces need powerful industrial fans and proper ventilation, shorter work shifts in high-heat areas without loss of pay, and more breaks from work. And those who work with waste workers have said it is essential to give them access to regular water supply, shade, or a relatively cool building near landfills, and prompt access to medical care when necessary.
Importantly, state actors need to improve the social conditions that would help reduce or prevent the incidence of heatstroke. These could be done in four ways: one, by carrying out extensive water harvesting and equitable distribution of water; two, by building more robust and less cramped housing for working people in urban areas with suitable materials (employment guarantee schemes could be widely deployed for both these measures, which would also help address the jobs crisis); three, by expanding and strengthening mohalla clinics as they are more widely distributed than large, tertiary hospitals and can respond to heat crises more quickly; and four, by having open consultations with unions, women’s organisations, and other civil society groups on what might help people the most. Given the faster rate of warming, we need to plan urgently not just for the present but also for the future.
The necessity of mitigation
However, adaptation is only one part of dealing with extreme heat. The other part is mitigation, the reduction of greenhouse gases. As a landmark 2020 report titled “Assessment of Climate Change over the Indian Region” by the Ministry of Earth Sciences states, greenhouse gas emission trajectories will directly influence the frequency, intensity, and duration of extreme heat events in India in the decades to come. Efforts at reducing emissions need to be global, of course, but how has India fared in this?
An electric vehicle charging station set up by the KSEB in Palakkad, Kerala, a 2022 picture. Inadequate charging infrastructure is one of the key reasons why electric car sales have been low. | Photo Credit: K.K. MUSTAFAH
The Central government, several policy analysts, and the media regularly claim that India is doing better than most countries in reducing potential emissions. This view is incomplete in its framing. A holistic examination of India’s emissions would consider three other factors: one, the large number of deaths from air pollution every year in India, to which coal/fossil fuel burning is a significant contributor; two, that poor Indians are, and will continue to be, among the worst impacted by climate change; and three, recent research which says that global carbon dioxide emissions need to fall sharply to 8-9 billion tonnes a year (from 44 billion, including from deforestation, in 2022) for atmospheric CO2 levels to stabilise. And they need to globally reach “net zero”—where anthropogenic removals equal emissions—for the planet to stop warming any further.
Against this background, a complacent comparison against poorly performing industrialised countries misses the point and can be massively damaging. Instead, the question should be, are we doing enough in key sectors? What can be done better? Put differently, how could our energy transition be faster and more just?
Within the electricity sector—the key sector in any energy transition—official data from the Central Electricity Authority indicate that over the past few years, electricity capacity has expanded to a significant degree only in solar and coal. Even with solar, for a range of reasons, only 9 of 57 planned solar parks had been completed as of 2023. Wind power capacity expansion slowed down after reverse auctions (in which suppliers submit bids and the lowest bid wins) were introduced in 2017, although this may now improve with the discontinuation of reverse auctions last year, wind-specific renewable purchase obligations, and the plan to auction 10 gigawatts a year.
Highlights
- Global average temperature has been 1.6 degrees C higher than the pre-industrial average over the past year. The underlying cause for the extreme heat is relentless global warming due to greenhouse gases emitted into the atmosphere.
- The primary response of the Central and State governments to extreme heat stress events has been the creation of heat action plans (HAPs): activation of early warning systems, building of public awareness, urban interventions, and public health interventions.
- Adaptation is only one part of dealing with extreme heat. The other part is mitigation, the reduction of greenhouse gases. Efforts at reducing emissions need to be global, but India has fared better than most countries in reducing potential emissions.
While considering renewables, the focus needs to be on electricity generation rather than capacity because that is a true reflection of its contribution. Partly because of the factors mentioned above and partly because of the constraint of intermittency, and with large-scale battery storage still at an incipient stage in India, the share of electricity generated from new renewables is still low. It was just 13 per cent last year, 25 per cent if one includes large hydropower projects.
Meanwhile, the share of coal/thermal power has remained at about 75 per cent, with hardly any reduction over the last decade. What is more, coal expansion continues apace: the government has auctioned several coal blocks—with the very large revenues it accrues as an added attraction—and awarded 23 closed or discontinued coal mines to private companies. This is part of a broader plan to add 80 gigawatts to India’s thermal capacity by 2031–32.
In sectors other than electricity, the shifts have been, unsurprisingly, even more modest. In transport, the focus has been on fuel efficiency and electric vehicles (EVs), but EVs have been dominated by e-rickshaws and two-wheelers. Electric cars constituted just 5 per cent of EVs sold in India in 2023 because of the high cost, insufficient knowledge about them, and inadequate charging infrastructure. The latter should improve after the recent policy measure to offer space along national highways to private companies to set up charging stations. But an added hurdle to the transition is that the petroleum sector contributes massively to government revenues; it accounted for Rs.7,48,718 crore in 2022–23.
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As for urban areas, India’s Long-term Low Carbon Development Strategy, launched in November 2022, highlights “material efficiency in buildings, and sustainable urbanization”. However, commercial interests ensure that the reality has been poor enforcement, building over floodwater sinks, and housing expansion by private companies that is heavily tilted towards providing for the well-off, all of which is neither sustainable nor equitable.
It is in the interest of its own people that India’s energy transition is faster and that rising emissions (see Figure 1) slow down. Historically, energy transitions have taken many decades. A key challenge for India in enabling a faster energy transition is mobilising the investment needed. It is telling that clean energy investment in China—overwhelmingly the largest source of renewable power in the world—in 2023 alone totalled $890 billion, larger than the entire GDP of Switzerland. But the effort has to be global.
Need to address structural causes
At the end of the day, extreme heat events in India are influenced by global greenhouse gas emissions (and not just India’s) and because of their accumulated stock in the atmosphere, not just annual flows.
Given the complex trade-offs such as warming due to reduced aerosols mentioned above, global emissions need to fall sharply for heat stress events not to expand and intensify further. In this regard, the past three decades have not been encouraging. Despite over 30 years of climate negotiations, global greenhouse gas emissions were 62 per cent higher in 2022 than they were in 1990 (see Figure 2). The onus to cut back sharply is on those historically responsible for that accumulated stock, which (except China) is rooted in their grim history of colonial plunder and military aggression.
We need to identify and address the underlying structural causes for this rise. They include an elite fixation with very high rates of economic growth; the inherent character of private entities to maximise profits; growing inequalities of income and wealth; and a rampant urbanisation often driven by rural deprivation. In the absence of addressing these root causes and bringing down emissions drastically, working people may be facing a future too frighteningly hot and humid to contemplate.
Nagraj Adve is a member of Teachers Against the Climate Crisis and the author of Global Warming in India: Science, Impacts, and Politics.
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