Electric cars won’t solve climate change, says Amitav Ghosh

TOI Correspondent from London: Kolkata-born, New York-based writer Amitav Ghosh says renewable energy, carbon credits and electric vehicles will not solve climate change and urged the world to instead focus on community solutions invented in countries like Bangladesh .
“There is no way through this mess. If we look at the recent COP, all the absurdities have now been laid bare, and when Greta Thunberg says blah blah blah, I think she’s right,” he said, speaking at the Global Institute of Cultures’ annual lecture at King’s College London in Thursday. night.
He said the West is obsessed with statistics and macroeconomic data, and all the literature on climate change – overwhelmingly written by the West – is largely focused on technical and economic issues.
“The only solution on offer is a rapid transition to alternative energy – we all know that will not stop extractivism or the competition for resources already present in many conflicts,” he said. “Everyone who has an electric car is not going to solve the problem. It just seems absurd. How much emissions occur in the production of electric vehicles and batteries? But people seem to want to believe the story,” he said.
When asked by TOI whether renewable energy, carbon credits or nuclear power were the solution, he said they were not. “Solutions and sustainability will come from local initiatives and efforts,” he said.
“Climate change is a global problem, but it plays out locally, and that’s where my interest lies. How are people reacting locally? Bangladesh has been spreading awareness about climate change for many years, the people are very well informed and they have their own solutions. They didn’t give up. Ultimately, resilience will not come from technological solutions, but from community connections and knowing your land,” he said. “If there was a crash scenario, who would you rather be with? A botanist who has a calculator, or a farmer who knows how to manage the land? India has always been a water-scarce region, yet farmers have been able to harvest crops from this soil for thousands of years. Every farmer who can do this carries around in his head a whole library that cannot be bought.”
“Militarization is the most environmentally destructive human endeavor. But there is no research on the environmental impact of militarization,” he said.
“During the Iraq War, the US military consumed 1.3 billion gallons of oil annually—more than Bangladesh’s annual consumption. It can be said that conflict and national rivalries are fundamental drivers of climate change, but these issues are rarely discussed,” he said.