"There are no passengers on Spaceship Earth. We are all crew". Marshall McLuhan, 1964
My colleague Ashank and I were listening to a presentation by Anmol, a bright young man whose firm had been engaged by Mastek, my company, to study our carbon footprint. We wanted to understand how much damage we were causing to the environment, and how we could reduce that damage. The discussions were very revealing.
We anticipated we would have a low carbon footprint - given the nature of our IT industry. We were wrong. We were actually causing almost 17,000 tons of CO2 to be spewed into the environment every year!
More than 60% of our emissions were due to electricity consumption - air-conditioning, lighting, and computers. Thirty percent were due to air travel - especially international travel. Anmol said this was pretty much in line with other software services companies.
We looked at what we could do to reduce our emissions. Since our new buildings were already equipped with state-of-the-art energy efficient equipment, we could at best save around 10% by changing desktops, lighting fixtures, and other such mechanisms.
We could trim another 10 percent by reducing air travel and persuading our people to switch off electrical appliances when not needed and share resources by using our space efficiently.
The other alternative was to invest in renewable energy - wind or solar energy. It was disappointing to learn that solar panels on our rooftops would hardly generate 10% of our energy requirements.
We could invest in windmills run by power companies in faraway locations, but even with government incentives this would require an investment of over Rs. 60 crores to meet our electricity requirements - a substantial sum.
E F Schumacher, the author of "Small is Beautiful," was once asked for political advice. "Plant more trees', he suggested. I asked the consultants about that, and they came back with some intriguing findings. They said planting 3 million trees would take care of our entire carbon footprint.
Moreover, as these trees grow, their ability to absorb CO2 emissions multiplies 4 times over 20 years. This would mean that planting these trees today might ensure Mastek's carbon neutrality for generations.
The main cost of planting and maintaining these trees is labor costs. Current prices are around Rs. 100 per tree but with scale, this cost can be substantially lower. In addition, if we use 'Shramdhaan' - volunteer efforts from Mastekeers, their friends and families, as well as others, we may even be able to bring the cost under Rs. 50 per tree.
This would bring the entire investment to a far more affordable at Rs. 15 crores. As time moves on, the trees will pay for themselves in energy savings. This exercise made me realize that we have a crying need for innovation - in renewable energy as well as reducing energy consumption in our appliances.
Further, while air travel has twice the energy consumption per passenger mile compared to a train, these emissions happen at 30,000 feet. That leads to a reflectivity factor of 2.0 times normal calculations. Hence, air travel is almost 4 times ecologically damaging as train travel.
In India, we may need to seriously look at introducing high-speed trains across peak corridors in order to reduce the need for air travel. We have the design talent in our IIT's and engineering colleges to make this happen. This is a call to all talented designers to give up your cushy non-design jobs and get cracking.
Do share your own data and insights on how we can be responsible corporations by neutralizing our carbon footprints.