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Powering aspirational India

How much electricity is needed by India? To answer this, one can either follow a top-down econometric model whereby one examines growth in the economy, looks at the relationship between economic growth and energy requirements, and incorporates influence of technological and policy changes exogenously, or The alternative is a bottom-up approach, whereby one estimates demand based on equipment saturations, efficiencies and usage. A simple method is to look around and draw conclusions. As per data for 2014 published by the International Energy Agency, average global per capita electricity consumption is 3030 kWh (1kWh =1unit). The corresponding figure for India is about 805 units, and for developed countries of the OECD, it is 8,028. A majority of the OECD countries are in the temperate climate zone. The corresponding figure for Singapore is 8,844, for Malaysia 4,646 and for Thailand 2,566. The projected global average per capita consumption by the middle of the century is 7,500 units. Generation & projected need:- An emphasis on energy conservation and improvement in energy efficiency of industry and household gadgets will help in reducing electricity consumption, but bringing it down to below 5,000 units per annum to enjoy a standard of living enjoyed by citizens of OECD countries seems difficult. Assuming India’s population by the middle of century will be about 1.6 billion and transmission and distribution losses will come down to the lowest technically feasible value of about 7%, India must plan to generate about 8,600 Billion Units (BU) to provide 5,000 units per capita per annum to its citizens. Many don’t have power in ‘power-surplus India’ why? The cumulative average growth rate of electricity generation in India for the period 2006-07 to 2015-16 was close to 6%. In 2016-17 generation by utilities was 1,242 BU. Data for generation from non-utilities is not yet available, but one can assume it to be around the same as in 2015-16, i.e. 168 BU. The total generation was thus 1,410 BU. Assuming a population of 1.3 billion, it translates to a per capita generation of 1,100 units. Thus, electricity generation projected for 2050 is six times the total generation in 2016-17 and in terms of per capita generation, it is about 4.5 times. India has a long way to go. The target of per capita availability of 5,000 units per annum is very modest because of several reasons. The percentage share of electricity in total energy consumption is increasing. As per estimates by the International Atomic Energy Agency, this share was 34.8% in 2015 for Middle East and South Asia, and is projected to increase to 52% in 2050. The Government of India has announced policy initiatives such as electricity and housing for all, accelerated infrastructure development, Make in India, electrification of transport, etc. which call for more electricity and on a reliable basis. Many have opined that we should return to a frugal way of living and consume less electricity. Can one expect the young in India to do that when electricity consumption is continuously rising elsewhere in the world? Aspirational India has a desire to work and live in air-conditioned spaces, reduce the drudgery of home work by using electrical appliances, entertain itself by deploying the best theatre system, commute in comfort in non-polluting transport and so on. Once basic amenities are available, an ordinary Indian will become an aspirational Indian. Human lives have become more productive because of electrical lighting and indoor climate control. Indoor heating for climate control increased productivity in countries in colder regions of the world and air-conditioning is doing that now in tropical countries, including India. Using alternative sources To achieve this we must maximise the use of low-carbon energy sources, i.e. hydropower, variable renewable energy (VRE), and nuclear power. Last year hydroelectricity generation was 122 BU; exploiting the additional potential will take time. A NITI Aayog report says India’s solar and wind energy potential is greater than 750 GW and 302 GW respectively. Assuming a load factor of 20%, this could generate 1,840 BU. All these numbers are rough estimates, but make it clear that the total possible generation from hydropower and VRE can at best be about a quarter of the projected requirement of 8,600 BU. Wherefrom will India get the rest of electricity? The share of electricity generated by nuclear power must be made higher as soon as possible and large investments must be made in research and development in electricity storage technologies to derive full benefit from VRE sources. Until installed capacity based on low-carbon sources picks up, fossil fuels have to continue playing their role. Progress so far:- Recent moves such as the Cabinet nod to the construction of 10 indigenous pressurised heavy water reactors, taking further steps for the construction of units 3-6 at Kudankulam, and completing all steps towards operationalisation of the nuclear cooperation agreement with Japan are all steps in the right direction.

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‘Order on net neutrality in a month’

The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India is likely to come out with its recommendations on the long-pending controversial issue of net neutrality in a month’s time. ‘Apps have it easy’ The issue has been debated since early 2015 in India. Net Neutrality is the principle that service providers should treat all data on the Internet equally, and not discriminate or charge differently by user, content, site, platform, or application. Demanding that the same rule should apply for the same services, telecom operators have reasoned that operators are required to ensure service quality and pay levies to the government, while no such rules are applicable on Internet-based calling applications such as Whatsapp and Skype. Internet-based calling applications also offer free-calling facility to users. Operators have said these services use, for free, the infrastructure created by operators. After a series of consultation papers on related topics such as over-the-top service providers and differential pricing of data services, TRAI had, in January this year, released a consultation paper on ‘Net neutrality’. The regulator had last year barred telecom service providers from charging differential rates for data services, effectively prohibiting Facebook’s Free Basics and Airtel Zero platform.

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Why fewer Indian women are working

Why should a woman have a job? Because it makes a dramatic difference to her life. Working and earning, the capacity to control assets, gives her a boost in decision-making, and lowers domestic violence. Why should we care that women have jobs? Because a labour force that fully represents half the population is likely to be more robust.

But despite the quiet revolution in women's employment around the world, India has been an anomaly , with female workforce numbers continuing to slide. A mere 27% of working-age women were working in paid jobs in 2015-16. A decade ago, in 2004-05, this share was 43%, the same as in 1993-94. In rural India, the slide has been much worse as agriculture fails to absorb them. India was ranked 136 among 144 countries on the economic participation and opportunities index in the Global Gender Report 2015. Clearly , something is wrong somewhere in our society that prevents women from working.

What about other countries? Apart from parts of the Arab world, everywhere else more women are working. China, with its powerhouse economy , has 64% of its women working, one of the highest rates in the world. In the US, it is over 56%.In the Indian subcontinent, Nepal and Bangladesh are miles ahead of us. Only Pakistan has a lower rate.

This doesn't mean that women are sitting at home doing nothing. They cook, care for the children and elderly , do multiple domestic chores, and in rural areas, tend to animals and gardens. All this is invisible work, unpaid and unrecognized. Census 2011 showed there were nearly 58 million women in the working-age population who said that they were seeking work. So, it is not as if women who are house-bound do not want to work.

Economists and women's issues experts have been puzzling over the riddle of India's unemployed women and several theories have been floated to explain it. Some say that more young women are studying so they are not looking for jobs.Others believe that families are becoming more prosperous so women are no longer going out for work. Some argue that marriage makes all the difference, while others think caste is the crucial factor. Chinese society has quite similar patriarchal attitudes as in India, yet they have managed to boost women's work to such high levels because their economy is creating job opportunities.

A recent World Bank policy paper has reviewed all these theories and found that none can fully explain the phenomenon. Analyzing NSSO data they found that between 1993 and 2011, women's work participation rate dipped by over 13 percentage points in rural areas but the increase in school enrollment was only 5 pct points. In urban areas the decrease in working women of 3.2 pct points was more evenly matched by an increase in enrollment of 2.3 pct points.

Another popular theory that women stop working as families grow more prosperous is also not validated by the data.Among the poorest 10% population in rural areas, women's work declined by nearly 16% while among the richest tenth of the population it slid by nearly 8%.Both rich and poor women were getting thrown out of the job market.

Similarly , the paper found that whether married or unmarried, whether Dalit, Adivasi or upper caste, whether illiterate or college graduate -women of all kind were increasingly not working. The key reason for large-scale and increasing joblessness among Indian women is that there are not sufficient jobs. The jobs that are available are marginal, low paying, insecure and backbreaking, like construction in the recent past. Then, there are issues of safety for women or absence of facilities like crèches. Patriarchal values too come into play . All these lead to women not getting paid jobs.

Between 2001 and 2011, India saw a dismal 2% growth rate of jobs per year.Between 2011 and 2015, this has further declined to just 1.23% per year. In this situation, it is no surprise that women are unable to find work.

No one wants to hire a mid-career mother

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All about bitcoin farms

Dalad Economic Development Zone, lies one of the biggest Bitcoin farms in the world. These eight factory buildings with blue-tin roofs account for nearly one-twentieth of the world's daily production of the cryptocurrency. Based on today's prices, it issues $318,000 (Rs 2 crore) in digital currency a day .

From the outside, the factory -owned by a company called Bitmain China - Inside, instead of heavy industrial machinery , workers tend rows and rows of computers -nearly 25,000 computers in all -crunching the mathematical problems that create Bitcoin.

Workers carry laptop computers as they walk the aisles looking for breakdowns and checking cable connections. They fill water tanks that keep the computers from melting down or bursting into flame. Around them, hundreds of thousands of cooling fans fill the building with whooshing white noise. 

Bitcoin's believers say it will be the currency of the future. Purely electronic, it can be sent across borders anonymously without oversight by a central authority . That makes it appealing to a diverse and sometimes mismatched group that includes tech enthusiasts, civil libertarians, hackers and criminals.

Bitcoin is also, by and large, made in China. The country makes more than two thirds of all Bitcoin issued daily . Bitmain, founded by Jihan Wu, a former investment analyst, makes money mostly by selling equipment to make Bitcoins, as well as mining the currency itself.

China has mixed feelings about Bitcoin.On one hand, the government worries that Bitcoin will allow Chinese to bypass its strict limits on how much money they can send abroad, and could be used to commit crimes.As part of a broader crackdown against virtual currencies by authorities in Beijing, BTC China, the country's first and largest digital currency exchange will stop trading by the end of the month. On the other hand, it may represent an opportunity for China to push into new technologies.