Mass beaching fuels 'unscientific' Japan quake fears

TOKYO: The mass beaching of more than 150 melon-headed whales on Japan's shores has fuelled fears of a repeat of a seemingly unrelated event in the country — the devastating 2011 undersea earthquake that killed around 19,000 people.

Despite a lack of scientific evidence linking the two events, a flurry of online commentators have pointed to the appearance of around 50 melon-headed whales — a species that is a member of the dolphin family — on Japan's beaches six days prior to the monster quake, which unleashed a towering tsunami and triggered a nuclear disaster.

Scientists were on Saturday dissecting the bodies of the whales, 156 of which were found on two beaches on Japan's Pacific coast a day earlier, but could not say what caused the beachings.

"We don't see any immediate signs of diseases on their bodies, such as cancer. We want to figure out what killed these animals," Tadasu Yamada, a senior researcher at National Museum of Nature and Science, told public broadcaster NHK.

Despite the lack of any clear link between the beachings and earthquakes — and comments from local officials downplaying such a connection — many took to social media to point to the link.

"Is the next one coming? Be ready for a quake," wrote Twitter user maoeos40d.

Another Twitter user wrote simply: "We might have a big one on the 12th (of April)."

The 2011 Japan earthquake is not the only instance of beached whales closely preceding a massive tremor.

More than 100 pilot whales died in a mass stranding on a remote New Zealand beach on February 20, 2011, two days before a large quake struck the country's second-largest city Christchurch.

Japanese officials have nevertheless tried to calm fears, and have insisted there is no scientific data to prove the link.

Scientists are meanwhile unclear as to why the marine animals strand themselves in large groups, with some speculating healthy whales beach themselves while trying to help sick or disorientated family members that are stranded.

Others believe the topography of certain places somehow scrambles the whales' sonar navigation, causing them to beach.

Once stranded, the whales are vulnerable to dehydration and sunburn until rescuers can use the high tide to move their massive weight back into deeper water.

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Is too much exposure to outdoors bad?

MELBOURNE: Several studies have linked exposure to nature with improved human health and well-being. But how much of the nature's dose do we really need?

Researchers are trying to find a precise "nature dose" that can trigger positive effects on health.

"Urban green spaces provide settings for a remarkable range of physical and mental health benefits, and pioneering health policy is recognising nature as a cost-effective tool for planning healthy cities," said study leader Danielle F. Shanahan from the Fuller Lab, Australia.

The findings are of growing importance given that in the near future, 70 percent of the world's population will live in cities, where they will face a rising tide of lifestyle-related disease.

Despite this, limited information is available on how specific elements of nature deliver health outcomes.

There is an absence of clear evidence about which elements of nature deliver which health outcomes.

For example, three separate studies led by ecologists reported different effects of the number of bird and plant species in an area on self-reported well-being.

"They variously found a positive effect, an effect that was dependent on perceived species richness, and no effect," the researchers noted.

The authors hope "to understand how urban nature can be manipulated to enhance human health" through "dose-response" modelling.

Nature exposure can occur in a variety of ways, from rural forest excursions to greenery viewed from an office window, and the differential effects of exposures require careful study.

The authors describe several possible dose-response curves and find that plateaus in health responses are to be expected.

Surprisingly, increased crowding and complexity of greenery in cities could even "decrease a person's feeling of safety and increase stress", according to the researchers.

"We need cost-effective and tailored solutions that could enhance population health and reduce health inequalities," Shanahan said.

The study is scheduled to be published in BioScience.

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Lessons for cops on wildlife crime

CUTTACK: Police officers were imparted lessons on latest techniques and tools to effectively deal with wildlife-related crimes, especially poaching, at a daylong workshop organized by the Crime Branch here on Thursday.

"With almost one-third of Odisha covered by forest, there is a need to ensure proper implementation of wildlife laws to conserve the precious biodiversity," said DGP Sanjeev Marik, inaugurating the workshop on 'Strengthening Wildlife Law Enforcement and Conservation in India'.

Over 55 officers deployed in police stations near sanctuaries, wildlife parks and areas prone to poaching participated.

Experts from across the country gave an overview of the organized global wildlife crime. Shekhar Kumar Niraj, head of TRAFFIC India, a wildlife trade monitoring network, and director of Police Radio Training School, Indore, Varun Kapoor elaborated on the legal process for better enforcement of laws.

"Wildlife crime is a serious issue and has turned into an international menace. Odisha is not untouched by the problem. To deal with this organized crime, police should be well-versed with latest tools and techniques," said Niraj.

Wildlife Institute of India scientist S P Goyal told policemen about wildlife DNA forensic and its application in identifying species. Senior IFS officer C Behera educated the personnel on intelligence collection.

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Toxic carbide waste: Centre red-flags UNEP study offer

BHOPAL: United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) offer for a comprehensive assessment of depth and spread of contaminants in and around Union Carbide factory has been red-flagged by Union government.

Activists allege contamination from abandoned factory, after world's worst industrial disaster in 1984, continues to affect people's health and environment.

Bhopal Group of Information and Action (BGIA) local NGO representative Rachna Dhingra said they received a response from Union ministry for environment, forests and climate change joint secretary Biswajit Sinha on April 8. "A four line message just stated our request for inviting UNEP for a study has been examined and they did not find a necessity for the study at present," she said.

"We are distraught with this information because Sinha doesn't even bother to share reasons for rejecting this offer," she added.

Earlier, Bhopal Group of Information and Action (BGIA) and its global supporters had roped in UNEP to undertake evaluation on spread of toxic waste.

"We were thrilled by UNEP proposal as it brought experience, expertise and UNEP being a third party will carry more credibility in Indian and in the US courts. It would strengthen government's case against Dow Chemicals," said Dhingra.

On February 19, when NGO representatives met Union minister Prakash Javadekar over the UNEP proposal he had asked for 15 days to deliberate on the offer. It called for UNEP assessment of 3.5 km area around the factory that continues to affect inhabitants in some 22 colonies.

"Minister's refusal to take UNEP assistance is only helping Dow Chemicals and delay in clean-up continues to adversely affect population," she added.

Experts agree that such clean-up can only begin after a comprehensive scientific assessment of the depth, spread and nature of contaminants is completed, she said.

Holding Dow Chemical liable for environmental damage in Bhopal, Union government filed an application in 2010 in Madhya Pradesh high court for Rs 350 crore as an advance for clean-up, but there has been no movement on this in last five years.

In 2001, Dow Chemical took over Union Carbide's global assets.

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Economic study pegs value for Sundarbans and other tiger reserves

KOLKATA: Tiger reserves may not be solely about conservation. They also have tremendous economic value, the first ever Economic Valuation of Tiger Reserves in India, published by the Centre for Ecological Services Management (CESM) and Indian Institute of Forest Management, Bhopal, a couple of months ago has revealed. Of the six reserves studied, Sundarbans Tiger Reserve (STR) sequestrates the highest volume of carbon. This was valued at Rs 46.2 crore per year. The service provided by STR in moderating cyclones is also worth Rs 27.5 crore per year.

"The current study on 'Economic Valuation of Tiger Reserves in India: A VALUE+ Approach' with support from the National Tiger Conservation Authority is a first-of-its-kind study in the world. The study attempts to provide an assessment of economic benefits from tiger reserves across a range of tiger landscapes in India. While a large proportion of benefits that these tiger reserves provide are difficult to estimate, the study provides quantitative and qualitative estimates of those benefits which manifest their important but unaccounted national and global contribution. These findings provide adequate justification for enhanced investment in such areas which is critical to ensure continued flow of vital life-supporting ecological, economic, social and cultural services from these genetic repositories," Prakash Javadekar, Union minister of state (independent charge) for environments, forests and climate change wrote about the report.

According to the report, the total forest cover in the Indian Sundarbans is 2,585 square km. Declared a biosphere reserve in 1989, STR has at least 1,586 species of Protozoa and Animalia apart from 69 floral species belonging to 29 families. Nearly 270,000 people live in the 46 fringe villages around STR. The report notes that STR is a source of regular employment for the local communities living in the vicinity. In 2013-14, a total of 157,600 man-days were generated by the tiger reserve for various management activities in which local communities were involved. "Conservatively using the wage rate for unskilled labour of Rs 206 per man-day prevalent in the area, the economic value of employment generated by STR is estimated to be Rs 3.25 crore per annum," the report states.

"The economic value of fish caught from STR is approximately equal to Rs 160 crore per year. It may be noted that this estimate is still conservative. It does not account for quantity of crabs and prawns caught from STR which are sold at premium to fish. It doesn't include the quantity of fish caught for self-consumption or the inputs that shrimp farms receive from STR as seeds. Considering that fish is the main source of protein for the underprivileged communities living around Sundarbans, the economic value of STR for fishing is very significant — economically and culturally," it adds.

The study has also estimated that STR has nearly 31.43 million cubic metres of standing stock of timber. The market price of this has been estimated at Rs 62,870 crore. This is significantly higher than Corbett, Ranthambore, Periyar, Kaziranga and Kanha, the other five tiger reserves included in this study. It has also been estimated that STR has carbon stock of more than 22.38 million tonnes. "Based on a recent study by Yale University that has estimated the social cost of carbon for India the total economic value of carbon stored in STR is estimated to be Rs 2,410 crore," it has been noted.

The net biosphere-atmosphere exchange of carbon in the Sundarbans has been estimated at 2.79 tonnes per hectare per annum. Assuming this rate of carbon sequestration across the entire forest area (1,538 square km) of STR, the annual quantity of carbon sequestered in STR is nearly equal to 0.43 million tonnes. Using the social cost of carbon for India the total economic value of carbon sequestered in STR is estimated to be RS 46.21 crore per annum.

Another important value that has been estimated is the cost that needs to be considered for providing waste assimilation service to Kolkata. The city doesn't have a sewage treatment plant and the Sundarbans provide this service. Taking the population of Kolkata at 4.5 million, it has been estimated that the city would require a sewage treatment plant of 250 million litres a day. Considering the costs involved in operating such a plant, the economic value of waste assimilation services attributable to STR for Kolkata city alone is nearly Rs 150 crore per year, the report states.

Sundarbans Biosphere Reserve director Pradip Vyas believes that this study is a move in the right direction. "Eco-system services are going to be really big in the future. Such studies will help people realize the importance of the mangroves. Maybe, some day, people living in Kolkata will be ready to pay for protection of the mangroves. A study in Odisha after the Super Cyclone revealed that loss of life was nil in places where mangroves existed. Where mangroves had been destroyed, loss to life and property was colossal. If the mangroves in the Sundarbans are lost, the fish catch will also go down by 60-70%. Take the case of Catskills' catchments that have been supplying clean drinking water to New York city for ages. New York has now started sharing a portion of what it saves to farmers in the Catskills to keep the catchment area clean," he says.

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Delhi air pollution: A hara-kiri in waiting!

Air pollution level of Delhi has been in news for some time now. Over the year New York Times published two reports about Delhi being Wolds's most polluted city. Recently an Indian newspaper published an article in which leading doctors of Delhi are advising their patients suffering from respiratory diseases to leave the city since the number of such patients has been increasing at alarming rate for the last few years.

What is more baffling is that along with being most polluted city in the world, Delhi is also one of the greenest cities. How does one explain these two contradictory features of an open expanding city like Delhi?

There are three reasons for the air pollution in Delhi and the general mess in India when it comes to urban transport planning and management. First is the number of vehicles along with the fuel and the emission standards. Second is the administrative shortcomings and behaviour of the motorists and third is the philosophical one.

If we compare Delhi City with Mumbai, London and New York City (NYC) we can understand why Delhi holds a unique place. Also Delhi is a land locked city and lacks the advantage of coastal cities like Mumbai, London and NYC when it comes to dispersion of pollutants. The sea wind help disperse the pollution when the warm air over the land moves up and cold wind over the sea surface moves in.

Let us first compare the number of registered vehicle, population, and the area of Delhi city with Mumbai, London, and NYC. The figures are startling in every way. Delhi fares worst among all four cities when it comes to the number of registered vehicles. Delhi's 11 million people living in 1,484sqkm area have 8.43 million registered vehicles while Mumbai has only 23.3 million vehicles among its 12.5 million populations living in mere 603sqkm area. Delhi has almost four times vehicles despite having 1.7 million less population and double area!

When we compare the Indian cities to the western cities it becomes clear why our cities are more polluted. London and NYC with roughly the same population — 8.3 and 8.5 million respectively, (approximately 30% than Mumbai and Delhi) have just 2.6 and 2.1 million registered vehicles respectively. This is just 10% compared to Mumbai and merely 0.25 per cent compared to Delhi. Also the areas of these two cities are nearly same as Delhi with 1,572sqkm of London and 1,214sqkm of New York City. Even Beijing City (16,801sqkm area) to which Delhi is often compared has only 5 million registered vehicles among its 11.5 million residents.

The reason for such less number of vehicles in London and NYC is not only the deeper reach of their public transport in use for long time but also because of the reasons like congestion charges during peak hours, strong implementation of traffic regulations, and high parking cost.

The number of vehicles has compound effect on air pollution when we take the usage of kind of fuel and emission standards in to account. Due to subsidy on diesel there has been increase in use of diesel vehicle in India that emits soot along with NOX, SO2, and CO2 that petrol vehicles emit. India follows Euro 3 and 4 (Bharat 3 and 4) standards which are very lenient compared to the US standards, especially towards diesel vehicles. Euro 3 allows diesels to emit 16 times as much NOx as the US EPA does.

Second reason for this level of air pollution is something we are so inured to that it is overlooked by public and the civic agencies alike. In places like London and NYC or even Chandigarh the traffic on the road is only because of more numbers of cars on the road; while it is not the same in India. Traffic in India is caused by poor traffic management and zero civic sense of the drivers. Why Delhi does have massive traffic congestion despite having largest ratio of road to the built up area in addition to signal free intersections and flyovers? The reason is that the moment one passes through habitable area like markets one finds that the shop owners have taken the footpath and people walk on road, bus takes half the road when it stops because bus stands are taken over by auto-rickshaw. All these minor inconsistencies forces vehicles to run at slow speed at which the emission is at peak. Almost 20 -30% of the time all the vehicles on the road run at less than 30 kilometres per hours or are idling for as much time. Also, all kind of vehicles run amok in all lanes of all the roads. Duration and length of traffic jam increases because rather than staying in their lane people move to the opposite lane. And many such behavioural exacerbate the problem.

Third reason is rather philosophical one. Indians learn big ideas like democracy, finance, freedom and even transportation as one acquires a skill. Just as a layman acquires driving skill without knowing anything about automobile, we learn big ideas superficially, copying what is practiced seriously in the West. We make road and put the signal and that's it. At the periphery of the road there is nothing — no pavement, no demarcation. Suddenly a world of bazaar will pop up beside the road affecting the traffic. While every inch of an urban area is continuously monitored and is fully in control of the civic agencies in the West, our civic agencies have a very cavalier approach to their domain and responsibilities. In America traffic cop is the most feared person on the road because of the tough traffic penalties.

Delhi needs to promote private parking businesses. It also needs to charge premium even for parking outside ones house if it is a metalled municipality road.

Many other aspects of urban transport planning are required to not only reduce the air pollution but also to reduce the distress of motorists and other stakeholders involved.

*All data are current and taken from government sources.

(Bholenath Vishwakarma is a Ford Foundation International Fellow and Columbia University graduate in environmental policy studies.)

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Make diesel clean and check its sale: Activists

NEW DELHI: The decision to ban diesel vehicles that are over 10 years old from Delhi has been welcomed by environmentalists though they have voiced their concern about how the order will be implemented and its fallout.

Former Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) member-secretary Dr B Sengupta pointed out, supply of food items, i.e vegetables etc, especially from other states, is dependent on trucks that run on diesel. The government should have a concrete plan in place to ensure that supplies are not affected if these trucks are stopped form entering Delhi, he said. "It is a fabulous order for the environment. Around 50,000 or so trucks enter Delhi at night and cause massive pollution. We have been asking for the trucks to be fitted with diesel particulate filters for a long time. However, I can only wonder how they will implement it. How will grain, vegetables etc come into the city now," he said.

Anumita Roychowdhury, associate director of Centre for Science and Environment, said the order was implementable. What she is concerned about is the rapid dieselization of vehicles. "A diesel vehicle emits three times more NOx and seven times more particulate matter than a petrol vehicle. This means that removing one diesel car is equivalent to removing three to seven petrol cars. However, to bring totality to this order, the huge sales in diesel cars must be discouraged. The action taken by banning older vehicles will be negated by rapid dieselization. The quality of diesel available in India is as it is 10 years behind the technology being used in Europe. It is imperative to make clean diesel available in India," she said.

The demand for a strong policy and a better regulatory mechanism was echoed by Greenpeace's Aishwarya Madineni. Welcoming the court order, she said the government simultaneously needs to strengthen its regulatory mechanism, like manufacturing and diesel quality. "Diesel vehicles have been identified as one of the primary sources of vehicular emission, but I cannot say how long the government will be able to sustain the court orders. What will help will be measures like stringent emission standards and improvement in quality of diesel," she said.

Roychowdhury added that the government needs to also look at additional measures like waste management if such an order is to be implemented. "We should not remove one form of pollution, only to shift it elsewhere.When these vehicles are phased out from Delhi, one needs to figure out how they are to be disposed of. We need a very strong scrap management system along with a recycling policy. In fact, manufacturers should be forced to make vehicles that are largely recyclable," she said.

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Anaesthetic gases raising Earth's temperature too

LONDON: Anaesthetic gases may help doctors to cause temporary loss of sensation in patients and carry out surgery smoothly, but by accumulating in the Earth's atmosphere, they also contribute to climate change, says a new study.

Over the past decade, concentrations of the anaesthetics desflurane, isoflurane and sevoflurane have been rising globally and the study has detected the compounds as far a field as Antarctica.

Like the well-known climate warmer carbon dioxide, anaesthesia gases allow the atmosphere to store more energy from the Sun, the researchers noted.

But unlike carbon dioxide, the medical gases are extra potent in their greenhouse-gas effects.

"One kilogram of desflurane, for instance, is equivalent to 2,500 kilograms of carbon dioxide in terms of the amount of greenhouse warming potential," said lead researcher Martin Vollmer, atmospheric chemist at the Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology in Dubendorf, Switzerland.

"On a kilogram-per-kilogram basis, it is so much more potent" than carbon dioxide, he said.

The researchers reported the 2014 atmospheric concentration of desflurane as 0.30 parts per trillion (ppt).

Isoflurane, sevoflurane and halothane came in at 0.097 ppt, 0.13 ppt and 0.0092 ppt, respectively.

The team did not include the common anaesthesia nitrous oxide in the study because it has many sources other than anaesthetics.

Anaesthesia gas abundance is growing and should not be overlooked, said Yale University School of Medicine anaesthesiologist Jodi Sherman, a reviewer of the study.

"There is nothing unique about desflurane that we can not do with other drugs," Sherman noted.

She argued that it is possible to live without Desflurane.

The study appeared online in the journal Geophysical Research Letters.

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Mangaluru's Pilikula to get hippos, Asiatic lions

MANGALURU: The Pilikula Nisargadhama is all set to welcome new guests to its sprawling zoo.

As part of the mutual exchange programme with the zoo authorities of Thiruvanathapuram, Chennai and Gujarat, the Pilikula Biological Park of Dr Shivarama Karantha Pilikula Nisarghadhama will bring three hippos, two Asiatic lions, white peacocks and a few more birds. The fauna will arrive at Pilikula in a week or two.

H Jayaprakash Bhandary, director of the park, said, while Asiatic lions will be brought from Gujarat, hippopotamuses will arrive from Thiruvananthapuram and the park will get a pair of white peacocks from Chennai. Since there are no caretakers to look after Asiatic lions and hippos, the park will make arrangements to hire trained personnel, he said.

"The Pilikula Biological Park, which is spread in an area of 82 hectares, has a unique captive breeding centre for king cobra. In addition to this, the park also has several facilities for breeding of mouse deer and barking deer. To procure Asiatic lions, hippos, white peacock and other rare species from other zoos across India, we offer them king cobras, mouse deer, barking deer and other rare species. The process of exchange of animals and birds through Central Zoo Authority of India is on. We are waiting for the authorities' approval in this regard," Bhandary said, adding that there are plans to introduce more birds and also to construct more enclosures for birds in its aviary.

Over six lakh people visited Pilikula zoo in 2014. The park, which used to collect an average of Rs 60 lakh through gate fee in earlier, collected Rs 1.5 crore in 2014 till March 2015.

The park charges Rs 20 for students and Rs 50 for adults. "Special discounts are given to school students," he said.

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Over 1 crore renewable energy certificates unsold at IEX

NEW DELHI: Showing continued sluggishness in the renewable energy certificates market, more than one crore such certificates remain unsold at the power bourse IEX, even as the government aims to boost green energy generation in the country.

Renewable Energy Certificates (RECs) are aimed at providing an easier avenue for various entities, including power distribution companies, to meet their green-energy obligations.

One REC is equivalent to 1 MWh of electricity generated from renewable sources.

However, the trading of these certificates on Indian Energy Exchange (IEX) has remained sluggish. The exchange accounts for over 90 per cent of the domestic electricity trading market.

IEX Director (Business Development) Rajesh K Mediratta said the inventory of RECs has been ever growing since the inception of the market as demand for them is fairly low.

"As on date there is an inventory of 1.22 crore unsold RECs, therefore all stakeholders including renewable generators are losing out due to the unsold quantum of RECs in the market," he told PTI.

In the last fiscal (2014-15), just about 30.6 lakh RECs were traded on the exchange whereas 96 lakh such certificates were available. Out of the total certificates available, 2.5 lakh were retained by the renewable energy generators for their own use.

Out of the total RECs traded, there were 1.6 lakh solar certificates and 82 lakh non-solar ones during the period.

According to Mediratta, the main reason for lower demand is the lack of interest shown by obligated entities in meeting their RPO (Renewable Purchase Obligation).

"The future of REC market is directly dependent on how effectively State Electricity Regulatory Commissions (SERCs) enforce compliance of RPO by the obligated entities," he said.

In recent times, the exchange has been seeing interest from few voluntary buyers of RECs.

"Under increased focus on renewable energy with target of 170 GW (1,70,000 MW) by 2022, it is more important to ensure RPO compliances. Therefore, despite its weak markets, it makes sense to strengthen by ensuring compliance of RPO through RECs," he said.

Interestingly, the government aims to add 1,00,000 MW solar power capacity by 2022.

Under REC mechanism, an entity can generate electricity through renewable resources in any part of the country. The generator receives the cost equivalent of electricity produced from any source while the environment attribute is sold through the exchanges at market-determined price.

At present, there are two power exchanges in the country — IEX and Power Exchange India (PXIL).

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