Concept Vs production

The TVS Motors’ concept of an autorickshaw was interesting and unprecedented. It changed the way people thought an autorickshaw could be designed. It looked like a trendsetter because it was more of a car than an autorickshaw.

But what got launched is a shocking replica of the ubiquitous autorickshaws that has been in the market for decades. Few things can change from concept to production. But I hope very few things have remained the same.

Though the TVS King is understandably, a different vehicle, the reason for sticking with the age-old design is puzzling !!! And its high time that the government banned these 200 cc, 2 stroke engines !!! If something has to be changed in the autorickshaws, these 2 stroke engines have to come first !!!

Buried in the sands….

Human greed can never be satisfied. Even if it means to abuse the very place we live in. Every single day, our activities make this place more unsuitable for the future generations to live in. The next biggest activity that is added to this list is the oil/tar sands mining. With the oil reaching more than $100 a barrel, the pace of this activity has only increased.

The biggest deposits of tar sands (bitumenous sands) are found in Alberta in Canada and Venezuala. With the existing technology, there are about 175 billion barrels of recoverable oil sands reserves beneath the 8,000 square kilometres in Northern Alberta. The combined reserves of oil sands can be equal to the existing crude oil reserves. The biggest concern is the environmental scar left by the oil extraction process.

The Alberta oil sand mining involves extraction of the 10-12% bitumen stored in the sands using hot water and other lighter hydrocarbons like naptha in a process that uses about 2 – 4 barrels of water for every single barrel of oil. You can find more info on this here. This process utilises huge quantities of the river water, releases more than twice the greenhouse gases as conventional process and also destroys the boreal forest area which contains these sands. The oily wastewater produced is stored in huge reservoirs in an area as wide as 50 sq. km. The polluting water seeps into the existing ecosystem, killing fishes and endangering human life.

With oil prices surging upwards of 100$, the situation is even grimmer. The huge profits generated by these projects can overrule the necessary actions required to stop the abuse of our fragile ecosystem. Until the oil refining process is improved to recycle the waste and manage the resources effectively, we will push the existence of life on earth to the edge.

More info on this topic can be found at – GlobeandMail.com

Miniature Earth

Stats of the world – simplified ….. with a strong message at the end. This is the reality !!!

The ship breakers of India

On the shores of the Arabian sea, is Alang, in the Indian state of Gujarat. It is the leading centre of world’s ship breaking industry which recycles the steel from almost half of all the ships around the world. Hundreds of tankers,trawlers, warships and every other floating piece of steel, laden with pollutants like asbestos and heavy metals are dumped here by the rich countries. Scrapping them in their countries can pollute their water sources and endanger lives of their people. Hence they dump it in poor countries, which grab them with open arms as they have a free license to exploit the poor, whose greatest challenge is to find a means for their next meal.

There is a complete failure of governance and the middlemen cash in by exploiting the people who live each day with death following them like their shadows. It is the responsibility of the government to protect their people from the greedy vultures and the indifference of the so called ‘developed’ world. The ground reality is captured in this Pulitzer award winning report by Gary Cohn and Will Englund of The Baltimore Sun.

You can find the report here – http://www.pulitzer.org/year/1998/investigative-reporting/works/day3/1.html