Green News

Subsidies for Power Plants

New and Renewable Energy Minister, Farooq Abdullah, recently announced that
the government would provide subsidies to entrepreneurs interested in setting up
power plants using renewable resources. Reasoning further, he said that
renewable energy resources were present in abundance in northern India and in
the next ten years optimum use could be made of it. He added that such subsidies
are required to motivate entrepreneurs to establish power plants using renewable
resources. Elaborating further, he added, "We require them to send us proposals
providing detailed information on the planning and working of their plant. On
being approved, complete assistance would be provided."

E-waste Rules by March 2010

At a recently held international roundtable on environmentally sound
management of electronic management in New Delhi, Dr Saroj, director, Ministry
of Environment and Forest, announced that the government was developing a
dedicated set of rules for the management and handling of e-waste. According to
the minister these rules would then be put in the public domain for comments by
March 2010. An expert committee constituted by the Ministry of Environment and
Forests is currently reviewing the draft rules that was jointly submitted by the
the Manufacturers Association for Information Technology (MAIT), GTZ,
Greenpeace, and Toxics Link in September 2009.

Green Jobs under Scrutiny

The Rural Development Ministry is conducting studies to quantify the value
of carbon credits generated through National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA)
activities, in order to assess if money can be earned through carbon trading.
Taking into consideration people covered and money spent to combat rural
poverty, it is estimated that it has created several green jobs. A ministry
official informed that about 70% of NREGA works are green jobs. According to an
official data, even if renewable energy is expanded forty-fold, carbon emissions
could rise from 1 bn tonnes per year to 3.9 bn tonnes per year by 2031-32. Under
energy projections that assume an even higher rate of coal use, such emissions
could rise to 5.5 bn tonnes per year by 2031-32.

Pachauri Accused

The Sunday Telegraph in its recent report accused United Nations top
climate change czar, Dr Rajendra Pachauri of capitalising on his links with
carbon trading companies like banks, oil and energy companies, and investment
funds, etc. It further adds that in addition to his role as the chairman of the
IPCC, Dr Pachauri occupies various important posts, like director or adviser in
many of the influential bodies that play an important role in the climate
industry. The potential conflict of interest was first publicly raised when he
was handed over a letter by two eminent climate sceptics after a lecture at
Copenhagen University.

Leaner UDRP Proceedings

The World Intellectual Property Organisations (WIPO) Arbitration and
Mediation Center recently announced the launch of paperless Uniform Domain Name
Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP) procedures. According to Internet Corporation
for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) announcement on December 7, 2009, the new
procedure would become mandatory from March 1, 2010, which has further signaled
UDRP providers to accept electronic filings with immediate effect as long as
parties also have the option of submitting hard copies.

EMO Recognized

The emission monitoring solution, EMO developed by Logica, has received
recognition from The Economist as one of the ten game-changing solutions to
combat climate change. EMO is a real-time monitoring system of vehicular
emissions that uses a plug-in device that connects to the onboard computer of
the vehicle and transmits the emission values from the vehicle to the central
office on a wireless mode. Emission data from EMO is used to offer differential
fuel pricing to the vehicle driver. With the aid of EMO, petrol or gas stations
can offer prices tailored according to every individual vehicle and the
associated driving behavior, therefore incentivising greener driving. If the
driving behavior is green, the fuel is priced lower and conversely if the
driving behaviour is poor.