The 'green' century - CSE Environmental Education

The writing on the wall says technology will be determined by environment

Few people realise that the 21st century is going to be the century of the environment. Technological change is going to be heavily driven by the environmental imperative and human technologies will be forced to mimic nature's cycles and gentleness.

Why do we say this? Let us look at the evolution of science in the 20th century. At the start of the century, Einstein and Bohr asked 'What is matter?' By the middle of the century, scientists were asking: 'What is life?' and 'What is the universe?'

In the 1950s, Watson and Crick unravelled the structure of the DNA, which finally led to the emergence of biotechnologies today. By the end of the century, another critical question was asked: 'What is the web of life?'

This last question was not asked out of scientific curiosity but from human necessity. The vast range of technologies that had emerged because of increased human understanding of nature was beginning to have major impacts on nature itself. By 1960, it was difficult to breathe in cities from Tokyo to Los Angeles, and rivers like Rhine and the Thames turned into stinking sewers.

Technological interventions into natural ecosystems led to major environment surprises. For instance, CFCs, seen as wonder substances in 1930s, was found to be life-threatening in the 1970s.

Not surprisingly, a number of emerging technologies are being driven by environmental imperatives. For example, in the last 20 years, continuous changes took place in the internal combustion engine because of environmental concerns.

Despite all the environmental efficiency being introduced, as the number of cars grew, and health effects better understood, the automobile industry was pushed into newer and newer directions. Car-free cities, which again mean totally new transportaion systems, are being thought of. Emergence of fuel cells has been driven by the regulation set by the world's largest car market, California, which has mandated companies to introduce zero-emission vehicles.

It is clear that in this century, every new technology, even those in biotechnology, will be forced to take the environmental concern in account… the writing is on the wall. For us to read. And act.

- Anil Agarwal, Chairperson, CSE