CHENNAI: About five years back we ran out of water at home and the borewell went dry. We had to buy water like anybody else. When I explored the issue, the underlying problem was bigger,” says Mridula Ramesh, who authored The Climate Solution: India’s Climate Change Crisis and What We Can Do About It. Mridula is the founder of the Sundaram Climate Institute, which focuses on waste and water solutions and education. She is also the executive director of Sundaram Textiles, an investor in cleantech start-ups and lives and experiments in Madurai in a net zero-waste house with her husband and two children.
The theme of the book revolves around climatic conditions affecting India. It is backed up by research, data and case studies. Some of the interesting topics covered include heat waves, health crises, mental health epidemics, heat stress and vector cycles. What makes the book relevant to present-day audience is a whole chapter focused on psychology. “I’ve narrated instances through protagonists who are commoners. I believe that the battle in climate change is a battle in mind. Everything starts with an individual or a group of people. This is crucial for people to evaluate the daily choices they make. You impact climate and the climate impacts you,” she says.
In order to cater to different sections of audience, the book sheds light on how women in certain areas are affected by warming climate, individual heroes who’ve improved the conditions and food that affects climate change and climate. “The book might discuss niche topics. Depending on personal interest there is something for everyone. But we must realise that the millennials are going to suffer the most due to the damage we’ve caused. Once you start opening up about natural concerns, the youngsters seem to be aware of the problems. Having said that, about 41 per cent of the population is still unaware about global warming,” she says.
Gathering data was a herculean task for Mridula during the writing process. There are 500 references used in the body of the book so that it is readable. The concept behind the book is to make sense for an average person and help process the data given. “Citing relevant figures is an important job. With previous experience in McKinsey and Cornwell my data analysis is strong. I believe that China has better data than India. In fact research on Europe or American would’ve been a cake walk. The more you delve into a topic, more questions arise. You will not have good data base in the country to counteract and most of the study becomes unusable. Science backed up by data and research would be an ideal combination to success,” says Mridula hinting on her next aim which is to do stories on similar topics for kids involving cartoons.
The book is available on Amazon and leading book shops for `550