Oceans - The Climate X Factor

This Week's Reason for Hope

Electric vehicles are taking off in India

Unlike US and Europe, India’s EV revolution focused on two- and three-wheel vehicles

The country is producing electric mopeds and three-wheeled rickshaws, some selling for under $1000

Indian automakers sold 430,000 electric vehicles in 12 months ending in March, more than three times as a year earlier and with cars accounting for just 18,000

There are 22 cars per 1,000 people in India, compared with 980 per 1,000 in the U.S.

Currently, 3/4 of India’s electricity comes from coal-fired power plants, however, prime minister Narendra Modi pledged last year that the country will get half its energy from non-fossil fuel sources by 2030

Sources

India Will Sharply Increase Renewable Energy, Modi Says - The New York Times (nytimes.com)

India’s Electric Vehicle Push Is Riding on Mopeds and Rickshaws - The New York Times (nytimes.com)

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Ocean Climate Solutions

A wave passing 100 meters of mangrove forest can lose 2/3’s of its energy

Mangroves straddle the equator, 42 percent of them are in Asia alone

Ocean carbon capture cycles

• Physical / solubility cycle - CO2 absorbed by ocean as carbonic acid leading to acidification and harm to sea life
• Biological cycle - organisms in ocean absorb CO2 through photosynthesis

Sources

State of the World's Mangroves (nature.org)

Mangroves as a solution to the climate crisis | Stories | WWF (worldwildlife.org)

Phytoplankton | MIT Climate Portal

The Ocean, a carbon sink - Ocean & Climate Platform (ocean-climate.org)