Economy is a subsystem of the biosphere, not the opposite!

On February 6, reports came in that the NITI Aayog, the government’s apex think tank, has commissioned a study aimed at examining the “unintended economic consequences” of decisions by the judiciary that have hindered and stalled big-ticket infrastructure development projects on environmental grounds. The objective of such an exercise clearly seems to give a message to the judiciary and policy makers that development of infrastructure – roads, dams, ports, etc. – are essential for economic development and economic fallout of the environmental regulations must be considered while hindering or stalling them.
The next day, on the February 7, in the morning hours, nature sounded a completely opposite view point. A massive crack in the glacier from the Nanda Devi Bio Reserve, almost 5,600 meters high in the Himalayas, caused landslides and flash flood that roared down the Rishi Ganga river in the Chamoli district of Uttarakhand to bring in huge devastation in this highly fragile ecosystem. People died, hydropower projects were completely washed away and immense human sufferings were caused. By the time I wrote this piece, it is reported that about 70 dead bodies have been recovered and about 170 people go missing. In fact, after a rigorous and long search operation, the authorities seem to be giving up. They are considering to issue death certificates for the missing persons. The cause of this particular disaster is still being assessed, but the overall impact of climate change on the glaciers of the Himalayas are already established. Such disasters are not new for the region. However, climate change is going to trigger them more often. Time to rethink our development approaches, both at the global and national levels.

Foretold, unheeded

Raini, the village of Chamoli district, at 3,700 metres above mean sea level, has been one of the places where the iconic Chipko movement of the 1970s started. The floods of massive mud and rocks, that gushed down from the top of mountains due to the lake burst that happened under the weight of a suspected avalanche, was first noticed by this village perched on the upper slopes above Rishi Ganga.
The glaciers in the Nanda Devi Biosphere Reserve spread across an area of around 690 square kilometres and form the catchment of the Rishi Ganga River. A 2019 study by Columbia University’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory (LDEO) found out that Himalayan glaciers are melting at twice the rate they were two decades ago. The melting glaciers are creating larger lakes at their snouts. These snouts are also called the toe or end of the glaciers at any given point in time. These are often like ramps. At this point, the area tends to be unstable and may not be able to contain mass volume of water that might fall off the glacier.
Scientists have been giving their observations on this. Using satellite imageries, some scientists have pointed out that roughly at 5600 metres above mean sea level, a crack had formed on the side of the mountain from 1 January 2020. This crack, scientists believe, caused a huge block of rock and ice of over 2 million cubic metres to fall first 2 kilometres down the mountain and then onto the valley floor. As it hurtled down the valley, the mass of fragmented rock ploughed through an ice deposit leftover from a 2016 avalanche in the area, leaving a trail of dust in its path, reported the Sky News that covered the analysis of these scientists.

This disaster was not due to a cloud burst that caused a Glacial Lake Outburst Flood (GOLF) in 2013 that affected a large part of Uttarakhand and killed over 5700 people. However, the damage downstream could have been prevented a lot taking a cue from the devastation that happened in June that year. The flow of the water was so high and wild that it first washed away the Rishi Ganga Hydropower Project and then the Tapovan Vishnugad Hydel project downstream in Dhauli Ganga. Water on the Rishi Ganga was flowing almost 2 meters above the normal level and the damaged concrete structures of the first project, added with the speedy water and other substance, destroyed the project downstream. The Tapovan project of the NTPC is supposed to have suffered a loss of at least `1500 crores.

Hydropower projects multiply the impacts

These hydropower projects were not supposed to be there at this place. A Supreme Court appointed expert committee, in the aftermath of the 2013 disaster, headed by noted environmentalist Ravi Chopra, had clearly recommended that no such hydropower projects should be built above an altitude of 2000 metres. This is a “para-glacial” zone from which glaciers have retreated. The youngest mountain ranges, the Himlayas, are fragile ecosystems and building dams and tunnels – that require tampering with the landslide prone mountain ranges – would be disastrous. The glaciers have retreated but they have left behind an unstable mix of earth and rocks not suitable for such dams and tunnels.
These dams have other negative impacts on such an ecologically sensitive zone. Such flash floods need a free river passage to pass. Hydropower projects however block this passage and thereby multiply the damage done by such natural disasters. In fact, the Ravi Chopra committee had also said that these power plants turn the landslides more devastating by blocking the flow of the gushing water from thousands of metres above. During the 2013 disasters the same happened because a number of under-construction hydropower projects blocked the flow of Mandakini and Alaknanda rivers. In the 2021 disaster, the same happened as the two dams blocked the flow of the Rishi Ganga and Dhauli Ganga rivers.
The power projects did not consider all such environmental consequences and were given a go ahead despite ample warnings from experts and the locals. Villagers of Raini had, in the year 2019, filed a Public Interest Litigation at the Uttarakhand High Court against the Rishi Ganga power project. They had complained that the project, set up in 2005, was resorting to environmentally unsound practices.
This they said was endangering the river and wildlife species of the area. Their rights to the river that was intricately related to the preservation and access to their cultural heritage was being impacted by this, they complained. Things don’t seem to have moved much beyond notices to the governments and the companies.

A development vision that respects nature –

Assessments are being done like they were done after the 2013 disaster in this region. However, will the things really move? That’s a big question. Climate change is certainly making these mountain ranges more susceptible to such disasters. However, unmindful alteration of the ecology is multiplying the impacts of these disasters. There should be an urgent review of all the development projects of the region, including the ones in pipeline, and a cumulative ecological assessment of the same should be done. A paradigm shift in the power sector is also needed in the region. Above all, we need to take climate change, views of the experts and wisdom of the locals seriously.
The Dasgupta Review, an independent, global review on the Economics of Biodiversity, published by the UK government on February 1 this year – after two years of extensive research – has a very strong message for all of us. This, the NITI Ayog and proponents of the conventional development models in the Himalayas, must especially take note of it. Humanity now uses the resources of 1.6 Earths, it mentions based on the calculations made by the National Footprint and Biocapacity Accounts. Most crucially, it acknowledges that the economy is a subsystem of the biosphere. We need to change our measures of economic success to guide us on a more sustainable path, the report points out.
The economies, livelihood and well-being of all of us depend on the precious asset called Nature. The Himalayan ranges, a fragile ecosystem, holds the water and source of lives and livelihood to millions of species including humans.
Ecology therefore be the prime driver of the development vision in such a region, and everywhere.