Blogs

This blog post originally appeared in TheCityFix.

Provision of affordable, adequate and accessible housing is one of the major challenges facing India today, as it surges forward economically and demographically. Current government statistics put the housing shortfall at...

Inducing a modal shift from private transport to public buses will reduce road traffic deaths in India. In cities such as Bangalore and Mumbai, the city bus agencies – Bangalore Metropolitan Transport Corporation (BMTC) and Brihanmumbai Electric Supply and Transport (BEST) respectively – account for 20-32 percent of the mode share, but were involved in only 5-13 percent of the road fatalities reported in the city in the last five years. The data suggests that the quantum of crashes per driven...

This blog post originally appeared on ET Energyworld.

In Davos, Switzerland last month, the World Economic Forum recognized climate change as among the top existential risks facing businesses over the next decade. Businesses have already taken note as more than 1,300 companies that together generate $7 trillion in revenue have adopted or are planning to adopt a market solution to the climate problem.

One of them is a leading Indian textile manufacturer. Its...

This blog post originally appeared in TheCityFix.

As today’s urban areas house more than half the world’s population and produce more than...

This blog post originally appeared in TheCityFix.

Photo Credit: Lubaina Rangwala/WRI India

One of the biggest challenges to climate action is not only understanding the risks of flooding, extreme heat and other challenges, but how your community might respond to these risks. What are its strengths? How might policymakers augment...

This blog post originally appeared on WRI.org.

Anand Mahindra, chairman of the India-based $19 billion Mahindra Rise conglomerate, told a World Economic Forum crowd that climate action is “the next century’s biggest business and financial opportunity.”

“Everything that our group of companies has done to try to improve energy to reduce greenhouse gas emissions has given us a return,” Mahindra Rise chairman...

Locals around Aberdare National Park say that the Kenyan Defence Forces hold a gun in one hand to protect the country from external threats and a seedling in another to protect an internal enemy - hazards of deforestation. Green Belt Movement (GBM), since its inception in 1977 by Nobel Laureate Prof. Wangari Mathai, has worked with locals and Kenyan Defence Forces to plant over 51 million trees in Mount Kenya, Aberdare and Mau complex - three of five major mountain ecosystems of Kenya.

WRI India's...

Devanahalli, a small municipality outside Bangalore with a population of 30,000 people, has successfully set up a faecal sludge treatment plant (FSTP) to provide end-to-end solutions for faecal sludge management (FSM). The Devanahalli Town Municipal Council (TMC) partnered with the Bangalore-based not-for-profit Consortium for DEWATS Dissemination (CDD) Society and the German NGO Bremen Overseas Research and Development Association (BORDA) for this project.

The entire municipality of Devanahalli is unsewered, and most households use onsite collection systems such as septic tanks...

Bangalore is one of the fastest growing cities in the world, and has become a poster child for the problems confronting urban India. Rapid, and often unplanned urbanisation has led to stressed urban infrastructure and lack of basic service delivery. Whilst this pattern of urbanisation brings many challenges, wastewater, or sewage management remains one of the most critical yet neglected areas. As in many Indian cities, Bangalore’s urban wastewater management systems presents a grim picture...

India has set out some of the world’s most ambitious renewable energy policies, including a target to ramp up solar installed capacity to 100 GW by 2022. Strong and clear policy signals, especially in the clean energy sector, demonstrate India’s leadership and continue to fuel optimism on sustained climate action. In 2015, India committed to reduce the emissions intensity of its GDP by 33...