On the other hand, if you are in charge of the barbeque stand on Saturday night you will ask, “Where can I find some good coal?”
This alone tells a story of mankind’s complex relationship with coal. Of course, one would argue that what is used for barbeques is charcoal.
What’s the difference? One is manufactured by nature over centuries, and the other by man by burning wood in the absence of air. There really is no difference except that a barbeque stand is really, really small when compared to a coal-fired power generation plant, which could roast one million large chickens in a minute. No one has really tried it because in India we don’t think outside the box.
When it comes to tandoori chicken roasted over hot coals, we are willing to put up with all sorts of pollution. We don’t ask the chef the leading question about where he bought his coal. We don’t ask the restaurant owner to implement all the pollution board regulations because he would naturally pass on the costs to us as one of the many taxes that usually appear towards the end of the bill and which are very, very irritating, but when MPT tells us it wants to import coal, we suddenly get environment conscious. Our relation with coal is complex and our relation with restaurant owners is even more complex.
Let’s face it, coal is dirty. It would blacken your hands and your face if you were a miner. When burnt it produces large amounts of carbon di oxide which is making the planet warmer. (Donald Trump has a different take on this). The dirty truth is, without coal we would not have electricity and who would want to take a bath in the dark? Unless you are stranded in Ethiopia on
the weekend.
The world has begun to realise that although tandoori restaurants are a big deal, producing electricity through coal is not. About 30 per cent of the energy consumed in the US is generated through coal. UK wants to phase out coal by 2025 and in France only 1 per cent of the energy is generated through coal. In India it is difficult to figure out anything related to energy because the figures are buried in reports written by bureaucrats for bureaucrats. But, we think a lot of it comes from coal.
Now we could go the France way which generates 74 per cent of its energy through nuclear plants, but here’s the catch: If a Chernobyl-type accident were to occur all of us could be barbequed. The chickens would love it.
In many ways Goa is lucky. It is clean and green because it does not have any power plants which means the unfortunate souls who live in villages and towns near coal-fired plants collect the fly ash, CO2 and SO2 so that we can breathe clean air and we don’t give a damn about it. We won’t even accept a small liability like importing coal. Life is so one-sided. Just
like activists.
