Despite efforts to develop alternate sources of energy, oil consumption is still rising rapidly and so is the price. According to analysts at Goldman Sachs, crude may climb to $150 to $200 a barrel within two years as growth in supply fails to keep pace with increased demand from developing nations. This by itself should provide enough incentive to develop new sources of sustainable energy. But shifting the global economy away from dependence on oil to renewable and clean burning fuels would require the best thinking from the brightest of minds.
At the same time, the biggest barrier to effective action against global warming is the belief that there is only one way to save the world from hotting up. In fact the reverse is true. Every proposed alternative to fossil fuels has drawbacks and no single method alone may be appropriate or effective enough to solve the entire problem.
However, a combination of different initiatives can maximise impact while reducing the downside inherent in each. One area where this can be done is in the transport sector where, currently, oil supplies 90 per cent of its global requirements – and the forecast for the next 15 years is that the number of cars worldwide will increase from 700 million to 1.5 billion.
In India, where the automobile industry is on a roll with the volume of model sales having breached the one million mark, the implementation of such an approach is vitally important. Hybrid vehicles, including flexible fuel and dual mode types which can use more than one kind of liquid fuel, and hybrid petroelectric vehicles, that can be plugged into recharge batteries, are perhaps the need of the hour.
But whether it’s going to be traditional internal combustion engines, or an exotic gas-ethanol-electricity combination, the infrastructure for quick and convenient refuelling or repair on the fly needs to be developed in lockstep with any new technology to be put into practice in the future.
Being relatively new in the field, India probably has an advantage because starting from scratch would be easier than, say, in a country entrenched in traditional infrastructure and which has millions of old gas-guzzlers on the road. Brazil has already advanced well in this direction. It’s time for India to follow.