Each day, Kiran Kasbe drives a rickshaw taxi through his home neighbourhood of Mahul on Mumbai’s eastern seafront, down streets lined with stalls selling tomatoes, bottle gourds and aubergines–and, frequently, through thick smog.
Earlier this year, doctors found three tumours in his 54-year-old mother’s brain. It’s not clear exactly what caused her cancer. But people who live near coal plants are much more likely to develop the illness, studies show, and the residents of Mahul live a few hundred metres down the road from one.
Mahul’s air is famously dirty. Even behind closed car windows, there is a heavy stench of oil and smoke.
“We are not the only ones facing health challenges in the area,” said Kasbe, who is 36. “It’s all covered with filth.”
Two coal plants plant run by the Indian multinationals Tata Group and Adani were due to close last year in a government push to cut emissions. But late in 2023, those decisions were reversed after Tata argued that electricity demand was rising too fast for Mumbai to go without coal.
Neither company responded to requests for comment.
Economic growth and the need for air conditioning in climate change-linked extreme heat have seen India’s electricity demand soar in recent years. But an investigation by SourceMaterial and the Guardian reveals the biggest single factor in the city’s failure to end its dependence on fossil fuels: energy-hungry datacentres.
Leaked records also reveal the scale of the presence of the world’s biggest datacentre operator, Amazon, in Mumbai.
In the city’s metropolitan area, Amazon, on its website, records three “availability zones”, which it defines as one or more datacentres. Leaked records from last year seen by SourceMaterial from inside Amazon reveal the company used 16 in the city.
As India transforms its economy into a hub for artificial intelligence, the datacentre boom is creating a conflict between energy demand and climate pledges, said Bhaskar Chakravorti, who researches technology’s impact on society at Tufts University.
“I’m not surprised they’re falling behind their green transition commitments, especially with the demand growing exponentially,” he said of the Indian government.
Kylee Yonas, a spokeswoman for Amazon, said Mumbai’s “emission challenges” were not caused by Amazon.
“On the contrary – Amazon is one of the largest corporate investors in renewable energy in India, and we’ve supported 53 solar and wind projects in the country capable of generating over 4m megawatt hours of clean energy annually,” she said. “These investments, which include our 99 megawatt wind project in Maharashtra, are enough to power over 1.3m Indian homes annually once operational.”
Amazon is building hundreds of datacentres around the world as it vies with Microsoft, Google and others for leadership of the booming AI market.
Source link
Disclaimer
We strive to uphold the highest ethical standards in all of our reporting and coverage. We blogs.grocliq.com want to be transparent with our readers about any potential conflicts of interest that may arise in our work. It’s possible that some of the investors we feature may have connections to other businesses, including competitors or companies we write about. However, we want to assure our readers that this will not have any impact on the integrity or impartiality of our reporting. We are committed to delivering accurate, unbiased news and information to our audience, and we will continue to uphold our ethics and principles in all of our work. Thank you for your trust and support.
Website Upgradation is going on for any glitch kindly connect at [email protected]
