Pune International Centre Hosts Climate Emergency Conference, Calls for Urgent Action

Pune, 8th March 2025: The Conference on Climate Emergency, organised by Pune Interanational Centre, discussed urgent climate challenges and actionable solutions. The event was held at the PIC Campus in Panchwati, Pashan, on Saturday, March 8, 2025.

Convened by Prof. Amitav Mallik, Founder Member and Trustee, PIC, the event was chaired by Dr. Raghunath Mashelkar, President, PIC, and Dr. Vijay Kelkar, Vice President, PIC. Dr. Madhav Gadgil, renowned ecologist and winner of the UN ‘Champions of the Earth’ award in 2024, was the special guest.

Inaugural Address by Dr. Raghunath Mashelkar, President, PIC:
Climate emergency is no longer just an academic debate, a policy discussion or an activist slogan. It is a planetary crisis, and the clock is ticking.
This is not just a crisis of nature; it is a crisis of leadership.
Survival of humanity is at stake, not of the planet. The planet will survive in some form or the other long after we are gone.
Building renewable energy capacity for India’s energy independence by 2047 is important because true independence is not just political. It is freedom from possibilities, from pollution, and from unsustainable industry.
Political inaction is slowing progress; strong leadership is needed.
With micro grid technologies and renewable energy, states like Maharashtra can leapfrog into future, powered by clean energy.
Last year, parts of the world hit 53 degrees Celsius. Farmers in some regions have seen 90% crop failure due to wildfires
Still we negotiate climate, as if nature is going to wait.
Deliberations at PIC are aimed at generating new ideas and to think differently.
There is one planet, one chance, and we have to seize the opportunity.

Why Climate Emergency Conference, by Prof. Amitav Mallik, PIC Founder Member and Trustee, and Conference Convenor:

As the seventh most vulnerable nation to climate change, India cannot afford to wait for others to do something about it. We already entered the climate emergency period, which means more of climate extremes and weather uncertainties. The purpose of this conference is to make society think and be proactive in action.

PIC will put up a strong paper on Green GDP.
We are lagging in climate action because the urgency is not felt. Election cycles prioritise short-term economic gains. Cost of not doing enough now will be many times after a few years. There is an understanding amongst the youth that if we don’t mend our ways there will be no job, no opportunities.

Burning fossil fuel has been the norm and the infra for it is in place. Now we are reluctant to move away from that comfort zone. This risks climate instability and threatens humanity’s economic well-being and survival.

The climate problem is global but the solutions are local. Western nations talk of tech solutions but the cost of those solutions is also enormous. It was after former President of India A P J Abdul Kalam’s advice to start with doing something in our own city that PIC launched the initiative to make Pune Metropolitan Region carbon neutral.

Address on Ecological Dimension of Global Warming and Climate Change, by Special Invitee Dr. Madhav Gadgil, renowned ecologist and winner of UN Champions of the Earth award
Seas are getting hotter. The increasing number of super-cyclones caused by warming of the Arabian Sea make India’s west coast particularly vulnerable. It has enormous consequences for nuclear installations like Tarapur and Jaitapur stations and ports like Vizhinjam (Kerala) and Vasco da Gama (Goa) ports on India’s western coast.
There have been protests against the Vizhinjam port, because of the enormous demand for manmade sand that the port has generated, leading to proliferation of quarries.
In the case of Vasco port, the Pollution Control Board (PCB) has recommended against deepening the port to allow import of coal. Burning of coal increases aerosol burden in the environment. India is the aerosol capital of the world. Aerosols cause intense rain over short periods, leading to more floods and landslides, such as the one witnessed in the Western Ghats in Wayanad, Kerala. A study shows that between 2010 to 2020 the frequency of landslides has increased over 10 years by 100 fold, and it is going to increase further.
Climate change-induced snow melt will affect the Ganga, Yamuna, Brahmaputra, and Gandaki and Teesta rivers, reducing their water supply.
Pollution control boards do not provide honest data. They are continuously manipulating data to show that pollution is far less than what it is. The Ganga continues to be awfully polluted, despite the Namami Gange Programme. There are sewage treatment plants along its banks but there is no electricity to operate them. Pollution of the river leads to depletion of fish supply, which in turn leads to unemployment among fisherfolk, who then turn to sand mining for survival.
In Maharashtra, the Indrayani river is full of foam. What is being done is they will pay a Japanese consultant to tell us what is the problem in the river.

Global Warming and Climate Extremes Challenges, by R. Krishnan, Director, IITM
Climate change is causing climate extremes.
The breaching of the 1.5 degrees Celsius pre-Industrial level threshold in 2024 is concerning.
Warming will lead to extremes of rain and heat. It will increase rainfall over Africa and India and make dry areas drier.
Coastal areas are particularly vulnerable.
Water will be one of the major concerns. Water remains a blind spot in climate change politics.
Warming is global but its impacts are local.
Human activity warmed climate at unprecedented rate in past 2000 years.
The warming is masked by aerosol cooling.

Impact of Climate Change on Economy and Solutions, by Dr. Ajit Ranade, former Vice Chancellor, Gokhale Institute of Politics and Economics
We need to make messaging on climate change much more simple.

It is not just a scientific or economic matter. We need to keep repeating the messages for it to become part of our daily lives rather than remain just annexures in reports.

When we overuse the ecosystem, we are stealing from future generations. Just as debt incurred now will have to be repaid by the future and unborn generations, the consequences of ecological deficit will be borne by future generations.

Economics does not discuss ethics and morality. We need to bring in morality into the discourse.

The ten top environmental issues of the world are CO2, air quality, oceans, energy, food, biodiversity, water scarcity, meteorological and population and waste.