Reportage on a planet without equitable or sustainable development.
India’s electricity challenge goes beyond adding more renewables
2026 has not been a good year for India’s electricity grid. The country has seen low rains and high temperatures. Between these, hydel generation has been low but power demand has been high.
In response, India’s Central Electricity Authority is wondering if India needs to add more thermal power than it had previously thought. This, of course, is a downward spiral. More thermal means more emissions and further acceleration of climate change. And so, out today, this report on what it will take to make India’s grid truly climate resilient.
The answer, as CarbonCopy and I found, runs substantially deeper than bromides like more renewables and more storage into more fundamental problems ailing the indian grid. Do read.
I am an Indian journalist with interests in energy, environment, climate and India’s ongoing slide into right-wing authoritarianism. My book, Despite the State, an examination of pervasive state failure and democratic decay in India, was published by Westland Publications, India, in January 2021. My work has won the Bala Kailasam Memorial Award; the Ramnath Goenka Excellence in Journalism Award; five Shriram Awards for Excellence in Financial Journalism; and, more recently, been a finalist at the True Story Award and GIJN’s Global Shining Light Awards. Write to me at despitethestate@protonmail.com.
“Westland closure: Titles that are selling fast and a few personal recommendations,” by Chetana Divya Vasudev, Moneycontrol. (Because this happened too. In February, a year after DtS was released, Amazon decided to shutter Westland, which published the book. The announcement saw folks rushing to buy copies of Westland books before stocks run out.)
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