Green pressure: Two top European banks withdraw support to Adanis' $12 billion Australian coal project

In a major setback to Gujarat's powerful Adani group known to be close to Prime Minister designate Narendra Modi, Germany's largest bank, Deutsche Bank AG, has declared it will not finance the “controversial” coal port expansion in Australia near the Great Barrier Reef. The bank said, it was responding to calls from environmental groups and tourism operators. The move comes nearly a fortnight after Australia’s provincial Queensland government approved a proposal to build Australia’s biggest coal mine – Adani’s Carmichael mine in the Galilee Basin.
Meanwhile, an Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA) report has warned investors it is too risky to invest in the project. Authored by Tim Buckley, director of Energy Finance Studies, Australasia, the report believes India cannot afford the price of imported coal: “India’s perilous economic and financial situation creates further uncertainty for companies relying on its ability and willingness to import coal, with its associated implications for inflation, current account deficits, economic instability and energy security”.
Pointing out that “imported coal would require double the current price of India’s wholesale electricity, which categorically discredits the nonsense argument that it might alleviate India’s energy poverty”, the report states, for “a new Greenfield power plant, imported coal would cost Rs5.40-5.70/kWh and rise 4% pa thereafter, whereas wind would cost Rs4.60/kWh and solar Rs5.50/kWh, with no inflation impact over time – making this a straight commercial decision for India to aggressively expand its investment in renewables” (click HERE to read report).
Following Deutsche Bank’s announcement, HSBC, Europe's biggest bank declared it was “extraordinarily unlikely” it would go near the project. HSBC's chief executive Stuart Gulliver said his bank had not received any proposals to finance the project and would need to consider it if one were made, but added it would appear to fall foul of its commitment to the Equator Principles - a framework adopted by banks to determine whether to lend on projects where there is environmental and social risk -- and UNESCO's position.
"If you look at what we set out in terms of the Equator Principles and if UNESCO's stance is as you say, I think it would be extraordinarily unlikely that we would go anywhere near it," he said when asked at HSBC's annual shareholder meeting. Australian environmental groups consider the two banks’ stand as “a win for those opposed to $26 billion worth of coal projects that plan to use the Abbot Point port.” Groups led by Greenpeace Australia fughting to protect the World Heritage-listed reef took their campaign to Europe, urging Deutsche Bank, Societe Generale and HSBC not to back the Queensland coal projects.
“They want to stop a government-approved expansion of Abbot Point that would involve dumping 3 million cubic metres of dredged soil about 25 kilometres (15 miles) from the Great Barrier Reef, an issue that is also of concern for UNESCO's World Heritage committee”, an Australian media report said, adding, “Campaigners against the Abbot Point expansion failed to win support from Societe Generale.”
"As we have seen, there is currently no consensus between UNESCO and the Australian government regarding the expansion of Abbot Point in the vicinity of the Great Barrier Reef. Our policy requires such a consensus at the least," Deutsche Bank co-chief executive Juergen Fitschen was quoted as saying at the bank’s the annual meeting. "We therefore would not consider applications for the financing of an expansion any further." Deutsche Bank was targeted because it helped refinance the lease on Abbot Point.
Those defending the port project say that it needs support for exporting coal from massive new mines planned by Adani and GVK, which is working with Australian billionaire Gina Rinehart.” GVK’s spokesperson has been quoted as saying that the Deutsche Bank decision to withdraw “doesn't impact our proposed projects in any way." Ieven then, The Financial Times, one of the world’s most powerful business dailies, describes the bank’s decision as “symbolic.”
The green groups in Australia have long campaigned to stop a government-approved expansion of Abbot Point that would involve dumping 3 million cubic metres of dredged soil about 25 kilometres (15 miles) from the Great Barrier Reef, an issue that is also of concern for UNESCO's World Heritage committee. The campaign has forced most investors out of the project. Adani is one of the last remaining investors standing for the port terminal, along with the GVK Group. Other investors have long abandoned their stakes, including mining giants Rio Tinto, BHP Billiton, Lend Lease and Anglo American.

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Ahmedabad's civic chaos: Drainage woes, waterlogging, and the illusion of Olympic dreams

In response to my blog on overflowing gutter lines at several spots in Ahmedabad's Vejalpur, a heavily populated area, a close acquaintance informed me that it's not just the middle-class housing societies that are affected by the nuisance. Preeti Das, who lives in a posh locality in what is fashionably called the SoBo area, tells me, "Things are worse in our society, Applewood."

RP Gupta a scapegoat to help Govt of India manage fallout of Adani case in US court?

RP Gupta, a retired 1987-batch IAS officer from the Gujarat cadre, has found himself at the center of a growing controversy. During my tenure as the Times of India correspondent in Gandhinagar (1997–2012), I often interacted with him. He struck me as a straightforward officer, though I never quite understood why he was never appointed to what are supposed to be top-tier departments like industries, energy and petrochemicals, finance, or revenue.

PharmEasy: The only online medical store which revises prices upwards after confirming the order

For senior citizens — especially those without a family support system — ordering medicines online can be a great relief. Shruti and I have been doing this for the last couple of years, and with considerable success. We upload a prescription, receive a verification call from a doctor, and within two or three days, the medicines are delivered to our doorstep.

Powering pollution, heating homes: Why are Delhi residents opposing incineration-based waste management

While going through the 50-odd-page report Burning Waste, Warming Cities? Waste-to-Energy (WTE) Incineration and Urban Heat in Delhi , authored by Chythenyen Devika Kulasekaran of the well-known advocacy group Centre for Financial Accountability, I came across a reference to Sukhdev Vihar — a place where I lived for almost a decade before moving to Moscow in 1986 as the foreign correspondent of the daily Patriot and weekly Link .

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A new report by Toxics Link , an Indian environmental research and advocacy organisation based in New Delhi, in collaboration with the Environmental Defense Fund , a global non-profit headquartered in New York, has raised the alarm that Sabarmati is one of five rivers across India found to contain unacceptable levels of nonylphenol (NP), a chemical linked to "exposure to carcinogenic outcomes, including prostate cancer in men and breast cancer in women."

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While I have known Jignesh Mevani, one of the dozen-odd Congress MLAs from Gujarat, ever since my Gandhinagar days—when he was a young activist aligned with well-known human rights lawyer Mukul Sinha’s organisation, Jan Sangharsh Manch—he became famous following the July 2016 Una Dalit atrocity, in which seven members of a family were brutally assaulted by self-proclaimed cow vigilantes while skinning a dead cow, a traditional occupation among Dalits.

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The other day, I received a message from a well-known activist, Raju Dipti, who runs an NGO called Jeevan Teerth in Koba village, near Gujarat’s capital, Gandhinagar. He was seeking the contact information of Atul Sawani, a translator of Russian books—mainly political and economic—into Gujarati for Progress Publishers during the Soviet era. He wanted to collect and hand over scanned soft copies, or if possible, hard copies, of Soviet books translated into Gujarati to Arvind Gupta, who currently lives in Pune and is undertaking the herculean task of collecting and making public soft copies of Soviet books that are no longer available in the market, both in English and Indian languages.

Boeing 787 under scrutiny again after Ahmedabad crash: Whistleblower warnings resurface

A heart-wrenching tragedy has taken place in Ahmedabad. As widely reported, a Boeing 787 Dreamliner plane crashed shortly after taking off from the city’s airport, currently operated by India’s top tycoon, Gautam Adani. The aircraft was carrying 230 passengers and 12 crew members. As expected, the crash has led to an outpouring of grief across the country. At the same time, there have been demands for the resignation of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Home Minister Amit Shah, and Civil Aviation Minister Venkaiah Naidu. The most striking comment came from BJP MP Subramanian Swamy, who stated : "When a train derailed in the 1950s, Lal Bahadur Shastri resigned. On the same morality, I demand PM Modi, HM Amit Shah, and Civil Aviation Minister Naidu resign so that a free and fair inquiry can be held. All that Modi and his associates have been doing so far is gallivanting, which must stop." Amidst widespread mourning, some fringe elements sought to communalize the tragedy. One post ...

Revisiting Gijubhai: Pioneer of child-centric education and the caste debate

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