分类： environment

India’s ambitious push to roll out a 20% ethanol-blended petrol standard, E20, across all national fuel stations has sparked sharp public pushback, igniting a heated debate over the rapidity of the energy transition, vehicle compatibility, and consumer rights. As the world’s third-largest car market and the biggest global market for two-wheelers, India launched the policy to cut reliance on costly crude oil imports, lower greenhouse gas emissions, and support domestic agricultural sectors that produce the sugarcane and maize used to make ethanol. The accelerated transition, however, has left millions of vehicle owners grappling with unanticipated costs and uncertainty.

India first began integrating ethanol into petrol supplies in the mid-2000s, gradually increasing the blend ratio to 10% over nearly two decades. In April 2025, the government moved forward five years on its original timeline to mandate E20 as the default petrol available at all pumps, replacing the 10% blend that 75% of the country’s on-road vehicles were engineered to accommodate. While unblended petrol remains an option for consumers, it is priced 40% to 50% higher than E20 depending on the state, and many drivers remain unaware they can request the non-blended alternative.

In recent months, consumer frustration has boiled over into public protest and a flood of complaints on social media. Thousands of drivers have reported issues including increased engine wear, reduced vehicle performance, and noticeably lower fuel efficiency. Last week, a mass protest organized by an entrepreneur aligned with the opposition Congress party drew dozens of motorists in central Delhi, where demonstrators accused the national government of unilaterally imposing the new fuel standard without giving consumers a viable choice or sufficient preparation time.

The administration of Prime Minister Narendra Modi has rejected these complaints, framing them as misleading misinformation spread across social platforms. In an official statement released last month, the government asserted that E20 was rolled out only after years of extensive testing and poses no risk of engine damage. Officials have also launched a public outreach campaign to debunk popular myths about the blend and highlight its long-term environmental and economic benefits, and enlisted major domestic and international automakers to back their claims.

In an unusual display of coordinated support for the policy, six leading automakers appeared alongside government officials at a recent press conference to defend E20’s safety. Rahul Bharti, senior corporate affairs executive at Maruti Suzuki, India’s largest car manufacturer, noted that the company had serviced more than 15 million older, non-E20-compliant vehicles and found no evidence of widespread fuel-related mechanical faults. Automakers did acknowledge that E20 delivers a 3% to 3.5% drop in fuel efficiency compared to 10% blended petrol, a consequence of ethanol’s lower energy density. Independent analysts, however, estimate the actual reduction in fuel economy ranges much higher, between 4% and 12%.

From a policy perspective, the E20 mandate aligns with India’s broader strategic goals: cutting a $100 billion-plus annual crude oil import bill, boosting farm incomes by creating new demand for food crops, and reducing carbon emissions to meet the country’s net-zero climate targets. Government data indicates the policy has already delivered measurable progress on these targets, and recent global oil market volatility sparked by the Iran conflict has only strengthened the government’s case for domestic fuel production. India is not alone in this shift: other major oil-importing Asian nations including Indonesia and Vietnam are also moving quickly to expand ethanol blending and flex-fuel vehicle programs.

Critics point to Brazil, the global gold standard for ethanol integration that Indian officials frequently cite as a model, to argue that New Delhi has skipped a critical step in the transition. Brazil built its ethanol-compatible vehicle fleet gradually over four decades before mandating higher blend ratios, and gives consumers a clear choice between multiple fuel options at competitive prices. By contrast, India compressed its shift from a 10% to 20% mandatory blend into just three years, moving to the new standard five years ahead of its original 2030 target.

Industry analysts confirm that the vast majority of India’s active vehicle fleet is not engineered to handle the higher ethanol content. Puneet Gupta, director of automotive research firm Mobility Global, estimates that more than 75% of on-road vehicles are not E20-compliant. A 2024 analysis by the Thomson Reuters Foundation reached the same conclusion, finding that only 20% of petrol vehicles sold in India over the past 15 years were designed to accommodate a 20% ethanol blend.

Interviews with mechanics and service centre operators across major Indian cities paint a mixed picture of on-the-ground impacts. While some service technicians report no unusual increase in fuel-related issues, others have documented a rise in problems they link directly to higher ethanol levels. Mohammed Arif, a Mumbai-based motorcycle mechanic, told reporters he has seen a steady increase in older bikes brought in for carburettor cleaning to remove sticky fuel residue buildup, a problem he attributes to E20. The extra maintenance adds recurring costs for vehicle owners, he noted. Basil Jacob, who runs a car service centre in Mumbai, added that customers consistently report lower fuel mileage, forcing them to refuel more often even as E20 is priced the same as the previous 10% blend at the pump. “They’re paying the same per litre but getting fewer kilometres,” Jacob explained.

Some industry experts warn that the most significant impacts may be slow to emerge, developing gradually over thousands of kilometres of use. Hormazd Sorabjee, editor of *Autocar India*, explained that ethanol naturally absorbs moisture, which can separate from fuel over time and cause corrosion in fuel delivery systems after 10,000 to 20,000 kilometres of use. Ethanol can also loosen built-up carbon deposits in older engines, which can clog fuel pumps and injectors and lead to accelerated component wear. Sorabjee noted that well-maintained vehicles may avoid major issues, and that some social media concerns are overstated, but acknowledged that long-term incremental costs are likely for owners of non-compliant vehicles.

A 2025 survey of more than 44,000 owners of pre-2023 petrol vehicles conducted by community platform LocalCircles found a sharp increase in drivers reporting unusual wear and tear and unexpected repair needs. To date, however, no independent public scientific study has confirmed either consumer claims of widespread damage or government and automaker assertions that extensive testing proves E20 is safe for all vehicles. This evidence gap has only deepened public confusion and distrust.

“If you’re going to force this on the public, you should be able to prove it’s safe,” a senior anonymous industry expert told reporters, adding that given the confirmed drop in fuel efficiency, E20 should be priced lower than standard petrol and remain optional rather than mandatory.

The debate is further complicated by widespread uncertainty over vehicle warranty and insurance coverage for fuel-related damage. It remains unclear whether automakers will honour warranty claims for fuel system failures in non-compliant vehicles that use E20, and insurance coverage rules remain equally muddled. Last month, private insurer ICICI Lombard sparked public outcry after a blog post suggested that using E20 in a non-compliant vehicle could be considered driver negligence and lead to claim denial. The insurer quickly reversed its position, confirming that motor policies remain valid for E20 use, but experts note that most policies only cover accidental damage, not gradual wear and tear caused by fuel use.

For India’s cost-conscious consumer market, where vehicle ownership represents a major long-term financial investment for most households, the uncertainty surrounding E20 has become a top everyday concern.

Rescue operations are underway in the scenic hill district of Wayanad in India’s southern Kerala state, where a catastrophic landslide triggered by intense monsoon downpours has left three people dead and five others unaccounted for. The disaster struck at a tunnel construction site Wednesday, when a massive wall of mud broke loose during heavy rain, tearing through the work area. Seven workers caught in the slide were pulled out with injuries and are currently receiving care at a local hospital.

Footage of the incident captured the full force of the disaster: a large earthen embankment collapsing under relentless rainfall, uprooting mature trees and sweeping away the temporary metal and fabric barriers that ringed the construction zone. Local law enforcement has segmented the search area into multiple operational zones to coordinate the effort, which includes specialized disaster response teams and sniffer dogs brought in to locate the missing. According to local police official Devamanohar, who spoke to reporters on the ground, ongoing heavy rainfall has significantly slowed progress and complicated search efforts.

In a surprising turn, Kerala’s Home Minister T. Siddique has publicly labeled the disaster not a natural event, but a man-made tragedy caused by negligent construction practices. Speaking to India’s official Press Trust of India news agency, Siddique alleged that the landslide occurred because construction crews dumped excavated earth in an unscientific manner, and failed to remove construction debris despite prior official warnings about the hazard. The construction company at the center of the allegations has rejected all claims of responsibility, telling the news agency that the landslide originated on elevated terrain far from the actual construction site, making the project blameless for the disaster.

State authorities have launched a formal investigation to determine the root cause of the incident and assign accountability for the casualties. This landslide is part of a growing pattern of deadly monsoon-related disasters across South Asia. Last year alone, extreme rainfall events including cloudbursts, widespread flooding, and multiple landslides across India caused devastating losses of life and widespread destruction of property.

Climate researchers have repeatedly warned that human-induced climate change is altering the behavior of South Asia’s iconic monsoon seasons, which typically bring two periods of rainfall between June and December. Once a predictable, life-sustaining weather pattern, monsoons now produce erratic, extreme downpours that dump massive volumes of water over short time frames, punctuated by extended dry periods that create drought conditions. This shift not only increases the risk of catastrophic landslides in hilly, deforested or development-heavy regions like Wayanad, but also threatens food and water security across the entire subcontinent.

As remnants of Tropical Storm Maysak dumped historic volumes of rain across southern China’s Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, authorities and local residents are grappling with widespread destruction, massive displacement, and a growing humanitarian crisis that emerged by Wednesday. As of Tuesday evening, regional officials confirmed six fatalities and 11 people still unaccounted for in the flood disaster, with more than 130,000 local residents forced to evacuate their inundated communities, according to the region’s official propaganda office.

Many stranded residents remained trapped in affected areas waiting for emergency rescue teams to reach them, even days after the worst of the rainfall began. Lu Xiaofei, a professional working in the nearby tech hub of Shenzhen, shared details of her brother’s trapped family in Lu Village, located in Guangxi’s Qintang District. Her brother, his wife, their 9-month-old infant, his parents, and elderly grandfather have been confined to the second floor of their home, after floodwaters rose to more than the height of an adult. Since Tuesday morning, the household has been cut off from both electricity and running water, Lu told the Associated Press in a phone interview.

Lu added that her brother reported flood levels climbed further overnight, leaving the family in an increasingly desperate situation: their supplies of drinkable water are nearly exhausted, and local emergency responders have not yet reached their community. Dozens of nearby villagers face identical unaddressed crises, she said. Many other trapped residents have turned to social media to plead for assistance, posting footage of their submerged neighborhoods and drawing public attention to critical shortages of food, water, and emergency supplies.

Local Chinese outlet Litchi News has also reported a secondary hazard spreading through Hengzhou City: snakes from commercial breeding facilities were swept away by floodwaters and are now loose across populated areas. Multiple residents have reported the loose snakes attempting to enter local homes, with more than a dozen people already bitten by the wandering reptiles, according to a local villager quoted by the outlet.

China’s National Meteorological Center confirmed that relentless heavy rain has pummeled central-eastern and southern districts of Guangxi since last Saturday. Cumulative rainfall totals have hit between 100 and 400 millimeters (4 to 16 inches) across most affected areas, while the hardest-hit locations have recorded more than 900 millimeters (35 inches) of total precipitation. Forecasters warned that additional heavy rainfall would continue to batter the region through Wednesday, worsening already dangerous flood conditions. In response to safety risks, multiple regional passenger train services have been suspended indefinitely.

As Guangxi continues its emergency response to Maysak’s aftermath, a new severe weather threat is already approaching southeastern China: Super Typhoon Bavi is projected to make landfall in the region over the coming weekend. The extreme weather disaster in China is part of a broader pattern of deadly monsoon and tropical storm activity across South and East Asia this season. In southeastern Bangladesh, monsoon rain-triggered landslides have killed multiple Rohingya refugees, including five children, while neighboring India has seen more than a dozen fatalities from severe monsoon flooding across its northern and eastern regions over the past three days.

This reporting featured contributions from AP writer Fu Ting based in Washington, D.C.

An eight-day underground fire that has ravaged a massive open-air waste mountain on the outskirts of Jakarta has pushed hundreds of residents from their homes, pushed local hospitals to treat a surge of respiratory illness, and laid bare a systemic national waste management crisis decades in the making. The inferno, which ignited on June 30 at the Jatiwaringin Landfill in Tangerang Regency, has spread across more than 15 hectares of piled waste, blanketing nearby residential neighborhoods in thick, toxic smoke that pushed local air quality into hazardous levels, according to Indonesia’s Ministry of Environment.

Initial investigations by environmental activists point to a buildup of methane gas released by decomposing organic waste trapped beneath thousands of tons of uncompacted rubbish as the most likely cause. A small initial spark, fanned by strong seasonal winds, spread the fire across multiple hard-to-reach sections of the waste mountain, where deep-seated smoldering continues to plague firefighting efforts eight days on. Unlike conventional surface fires, this blaze burns within the compacted layers of waste, requiring specialized response tactics. Authorities have deployed a large contingent of resources including helicopters, water tankers, bulldozers, and surveillance drones to contain and extinguish the fire, with officials projecting full containment by the end of the week.

For local residents, the impact has been immediate and devastating. Hundreds have been forced to evacuate their smoke-filled homes to government-run emergency shelters, with many reporting severe respiratory irritation from toxic fumes. “The smoke was so thick you couldn’t see anyone,” 45-year-old local resident Sarmanah told reporters. “It stings the nose, makes you cough and have a runny nose, and makes you unable to breathe… We were forced to leave the house because we couldn’t take it anymore.” As of the latest update, local health authorities have examined at least 234 residents for smoke-related respiratory issues, with 72 confirmed cases of acute respiratory tract infection. While hazardous air quality has eased slightly in recent days, active hotspots and smoldering pockets of fire remain in the western and southern sections of the landfill.

Environmental campaigners say the Jatiwaringin fire is not an isolated accident, but a predictable “ecological disaster resulting from systemic negligence” that has plagued Indonesia’s waste management sector for years. According to the Indonesian environmental NGO Forum for the Environment (Walhi), the Jatiwaringin facility was only designed to handle 2,700 tons of waste per day, which meets just 59% of Tangerang Regency’s total daily waste output. The excess waste is dumped illegally in unregulated open sites within 100 meters of residential neighborhoods, creating sprawling, unmanaged waste mountains that trap methane and create a persistent public safety risk.

Long before the current blaze, local residents reported constant issues with foul odors, pest infestations, and fears of catastrophic landslides from the overgrown waste piles. Climate change and more frequent extreme heat waves have exacerbated the risk, turning these unregulated dumping grounds into what activists describe as “time bombs” waiting for a single spark to ignite. This pattern is not unique to Jatiwaringin: major landfill fires swept across multiple Indonesian sites in 2023, including a 40-hectare blaze at Bandung Regency’s Sarimukti Landfill and a fire that destroyed 80% of a 35-hectare Tangerang landfill, both linked to methane buildup from poor waste management.

In response to the disaster, Indonesian officials announced that a full investigation into the cause of the Jatiwaringin fire will begin once extinguishing operations are complete. The Ministry of Environment and Forestry also plans to conduct a nationwide evaluation of 390 landfills starting in early August 2026, and confirmed that Jatiwaringin already received administrative sanctions for poor management practices in 2025. Authorities have ordered local governments to transition to controlled landfill systems, where waste is compacted and regularly covered with soil to reduce methane buildup and fire risk.

But activists warn that incremental changes and emergency responses are not enough to address the root of the crisis. Walhi campaigner Wahyu Eka Styawan argues that persistent underfunding for regional waste management, weak enforcement of existing environmental regulations, and a lack of public education on source-separated organic waste have created conditions where disasters like this are inevitable. “This is a time bomb of accumulated waste management problems that have been ignored for years without fundamental improvements,” Wahyu said. Without systemic changes that reduce waste at the source, implement consistent sorting, and process organic waste to prevent methane formation, he added, “It could definitely catch fire again if the pattern isn’t changed. Once the weather gets hot again, be prepared for more fires.”

The 2026 Pacific typhoon season has opened with a catastrophic blow as Typhoon Maysak tore through southern and central China over the weekend, leaving at least 15 people dead, tens of thousands displaced, and widespread destruction in its wake. Characterized by sudden onset and intense, short-duration gale-force winds, the storm dumped unprecedented volumes of rain across southern Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, triggering dam breaches, riverbank overflows and flash floods that engulfed communities in mere hours.

In Renhe Village, located near the regional capital Nanning, the downpour began on a seemingly typical Sunday. What started as routine seasonal rain quickly escalated into an unmanageable disaster: by the early hours of Monday, floodwaters reached knee height across the village, and by dawn, the entire first floors of residential buildings were fully submerged. Local resident Zhou, who is currently staying outside Guangxi, recounted the chaos of the evacuation to the BBC, noting that the flood advanced so rapidly that fleeing villagers had no time to grab essential supplies including food.

Zhou’s family is among more than 60,000 people displaced across Guangxi, with official figures putting the total number of people affected by the deluge at close to 90,000. Even days after the storm hit, thousands of residents remain trapped on rooftops and in isolated mountain communities, struggling with critical shortages of food and clean water. Zhou told reporters that four-month-old niece of hers, still trapped in the village with other family members, has been without milk for more than 24 hours. Trapped communities gathered on higher ground are also rapidly running out of basic necessities, as a lack of sufficient rescue personnel and equipment slows relief efforts. Another local resident, Huang from Yunbiao Town, told the BBC that floodwaters submerged entire villages in just 10 minutes, leaving rescuers unable to reach every vulnerable resident in time. “The lifeboats they brought were too small to travel far through the swollen floodwaters, and there simply were not enough workers to cover all the affected areas,” Huang explained. Compounding the danger, widespread power and internet outages have cut off communication between trapped residents and their family members outside the disaster zone, leaving many to wait in agonizing uncertainty for news of their loved ones.

Worsening the already dangerous conditions, floodwaters have swept both wild snakes and commercially farmed snakes from local farms into residential areas. A video shared with the BBC from a local village chat group shows a large black snake slithering across the mud-caked floor of a flooded home, as onlookers react in alarm. Commercially raised snakes are common in parts of China, farmed for use in traditional medicine, meat, and the production of anti-venom, making their escape into flooded communities an added lethal hazard for displaced residents waiting for rescue.

The impact of Typhoon Maysak extended hundreds of kilometers north to central China’s Hubei Province, where the storm’s warm southern air collided with cold northern air masses to spawn rare tornadoes – the first to hit the region since 2021. The twisters swept through the cities of Ezhou and Huanggang, leaving 11 dead, thousands of homes damaged, and widespread panic. Videos circulating on Chinese social media capture the chaos: outdoor dining furniture is tossed through the air by powerful winds, electrical sparks fly across storm-battered streets, and diners scream as they scramble for safety. In one devastating incident in Huanggang, a man was sucked out of his 12th-floor apartment after the tornado shattered his windows, blowing him and his furniture out onto the street. He remains in intensive care as of the latest updates. A Huanggang student told the BBC he initially expected an ordinary summer thunderstorm, until he saw debris flying through the air outside his dormitory window. “Many students were cut by flying broken glass,” he said. “It wasn’t until the wind stopped that I realized I had just survived a major disaster.”

Tragedy from this season’s early extreme weather has also struck other parts of northern China. Over the weekend, flash floods in Tongliao, Inner Mongolia, killed two cattle farmers, while record-breaking rainfall in Fushun, Liaoning Province, left three people dead. Average rainfall in parts of Fushun between 1 a.m. and 7 a.m. local time shattered all historical records for the region, according to state media.

In response to the widespread devastation, Chinese President Xi Jinping has ordered all-out rescue and relief operations across affected regions, emphasizing the critical importance of treating injured residents, resettling displaced communities, and executing disaster prevention work effectively. State media has broadcast regular footage of rescue crews in life vests and helmets navigating swollen floodwaters on inflatable boats to reach trapped residents. However, local authorities in Nanning have warned that continuing extremely heavy rainfall is hampering ongoing search and rescue efforts, slowing access to isolated communities.

As emergency crews work to reach those trapped, a new threat is already approaching on the horizon: meteorological forecasts show Super Typhoon Bavi is currently churning across the western Pacific, on track to make landfall on China’s eastern coast later this week, bringing the risk of a second wave of extreme weather and flooding for already strained disaster response teams.

Against the snow-capped backdrop of the Himalayan mountains, the iconic shikara wooden boats glide gracefully across Srinagar’s Dal Lake each morning, a postcard-perfect image that has drawn tourists to Indian-controlled Kashmir for generations. But behind this picturesque facade, one of South Asia’s most celebrated natural landmarks is quietly dying — and it is far from alone. A toxic combination of unregulated pollution, unplanned residential and agricultural encroachment, invasive vegetation, and climate-driven warming is pushing Dal Lake and hundreds of Kashmir’s other natural lakes toward irreversible collapse, with devastating consequences for local ecosystems, livelihoods, and the region’s core tourism economy.

Official government data underscores the scale of the crisis. A 2025 Indian government analysis found that since 1967, 315 of Kashmir’s 697 recorded natural lakes have vanished entirely, while another 203 have shrunk dramatically in surface area. Dozens of water bodies once mapped as full-year lakes have been reduced to shallow seasonal marshes, and many have been completely paved over or converted to farmland to accommodate the region’s growing population.

Dal Lake, which anchors Srinagar’s tourism sector and has long been the cultural heart of Kashmir, is among the fortunate few: it receives consistent, funded restoration attention from local authorities, a luxury most other Kashmir lakes do not get. Even so, the work of keeping the lake clear of choking invasive weeds and accumulated waste is a grueling, seemingly futile battle for the frontline workers tasked with its protection.

“We are afraid to touch the water with bare hands,” explained Ghulam Rasool, a weed cleaner employed by the local Lake Conservation and Management Authority (LCMA), during an on-site interview in May 2026. “Whenever we need to clean something by hand, we wear gloves, because without them our hands quickly develop painful allergies. Sometimes it feels impossible to keep up. Sewage drains flow directly into the lake, and water streams coming down from the mountains bring all kinds of waste — diapers, plastic bottles, every sort of garbage you can imagine.”

Every day, dozens of cleaners like Rasool work alongside heavy excavators to pull tons of weeds and solid waste from Dal Lake’s waters, with mounds of cleared debris visible along the lake’s shoreline. The root of the invasive weed problem, LCMA officials explain, lies in the untreated human waste that still flows into the lake. While more than 75% of Srinagar’s population is connected to a municipal sewage treatment system, thousands of unregulated homes built along the lake’s banks remain unconnected, flushing nitrogen- and phosphorus-rich waste directly into the water that fuels explosive invasive weed growth.

Encroachment by residential construction and agricultural land has also chipped away at Dal Lake’s boundaries for decades. Where open water once stretched, small farm plots and illegal structures connected by rickety wooden footbridges are now commonplace, with cattle grazing openly on reclaimed land that was once part of the lake. The same pattern plays out across nearly every major lake in the region, including Wular Lake, Kashmir’s largest freshwater body located 40 miles northwest of Srinagar.

Climate change has supercharged this slow decline, scientists warn. The Himalayan region is warming at a rate faster than the global average, amplified by the region’s high elevation. This rapid warming has triggered earlier spring snowmelt, reduced overall winter snowfall, and brought more frequent extreme rainfall events, all of which disrupt the steady flow of water that feeds Kashmir’s lakes. Glacial melt has also increased the volume of sediment carried downstream into lakes, filling them in faster and reducing their overall depth over time.

“While glacial melt can deliver a short-term increase in water flow, over the long term it erodes the natural water storage system that sustains rivers and lakes through dry summer months,” noted Sher Muhammad, a glaciologist with the International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development, based in Kathmandu. Irrfan Rashid, an environmental scientist at the University of Kashmir, added that climate change has upended nearly every core sector of Kashmir’s economy. “It has impacted hydropower generation, tourism, and even our high-value apple and saffron farms, all hit by erratic extreme weather in recent years,” he said.

For fishing communities that have relied on Kashmir’s lakes for centuries, the damage is already catastrophic. At Wular Lake, which historically acted as a natural flood buffer for the Jhelum River, 45-year-old fisherman Abdul Rasheed says his daily income has plummeted from roughly 1,000 rupees ($11) per day just a decade ago to just 100 to 200 rupees ($1 to $2) per full night of fishing. The lake has grown so shallow that navigating fishing boats through dense patches of invasive vegetation is nearly impossible, and decades of encroachment have reduced its total surface area by 45% since 1907, according to a 2007 analysis by conservation group Wetlands International. The same report warned that Wular’s degradation increases flood risk across the entire Kashmir Valley, because the lake can no longer absorb excess overflow from the Jhelum during monsoon season.

“Now even a skilled fisherman comes home with no more than 1 kilogram of fish, when a novice could catch 4 kilograms when I was young,” said 55-year-old veteran Wular fisher Bashir Ahmed. Most local fishers, he added, doubt future generations will be able to make a living from the lake at all.

Local authorities acknowledge that the crisis demands far more funding and coordinated action than what is currently allocated, but say they are working with existing resources to slow degradation. The LCMA, established in 1997, brings together civil engineers, ecologists, forest officials, and law enforcement to address encroachment and pollution, but systemic change requires broader policy action and public buy-in to save Kashmir’s iconic lakes.

This reporting was supported by private foundation funding for AP’s climate and environmental coverage, with the AP retaining full editorial control over all content.