Environment & Ecology
Climate, biodiversity, pollution control and environmental legislation
Supreme Court says 10 km radius buffer for mining extends to all wetland reserves
The Supreme Court, in the continuing *T.N. Godavarman Thirumulpad v. Union of India* proceedings, held that the 10 km mining restriction around wetland conse...
India’s distributed solar capacity jumps to 31.5 GW, but regulatory hurdles slow wider clean energy push
India's distributed (decentralized, small-scale) solar capacity reached 31.5 GW in FY26, up 17-fold from 1.8 GW in FY18 Rooftop solar capacity grew from 1.1 ...
Strengthening peatland emissions monitoring: New FAO report updates factors, points out data gaps
The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) released the Peat-Emit report, "Supporting Developing Economies to Estimate and Report Greenhouse Gas Emissions f...
India on e-wheels: How electricity began to enter country’s road transport energy mix
Electricity's share of India's road transport energy rose 110-fold, from 0.3 petajoules in 2016-17 to about 33 petajoules in 2025-26, but still remains under...
DGCA likely to mandate carbon emissions reporting for international flights
The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) is set to mandate that Indian and foreign carriers operating international flights report data covering a mi...
India gets 101st 'Ramsar' site as Arunachal Pradesh's Glaw Lake joins elite global list of protected wetlands
Glaw Lake, a high-altitude wetland in Arunachal Pradesh, has been designated as India's 101st site under the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands. The designation e...
‘Ken-Betwa river-linking project will have severe consequences’
Water resources experts have raised concerns that the Ken-Betwa river-linking project will have severe hydrological and ecological consequences for the Bunde...
India targets 874 GW installed power capacity by 2031-32
India's installed power generation capacity is projected to reach 874 GW by 2031-32, up from a current installed base of about 549 GW (5,48,858 MW as of mid-...
Cabinet approves Rs 5,070 crore floating solar scheme
The Union Cabinet approved the Pradhan Mantri Surya Sarovar Yojana (PM-SSY) on 31 July 2026, with a total outlay of Rs 5,070 crore The scheme targets develop...
CERC proposes transmission charge relief for delayed renewable projects
The Central Electricity Regulatory Commission (CERC) has proposed relief on interstate transmission charges for renewable energy (RE) projects that have face...
Two-thirds of India’s 58 tiger reserves have either declining prey base or poor habitat or both; nine have zero or critically low tiger numbers, says government report
A government analysis, the National Tiger Conservation Authority's "Roadmap for Active Management of Tigers in India" (based on the 2022 All India Tiger Esti...
India is home to 13,703 species of lepidoptera, about 8.25% of all known species of butterflies and moths
The Zoological Survey of India (ZSI) has completed the country's first comprehensive national catalogue of Lepidoptera (butterflies and moths), documenting 1...
Amid concurrence and disagreement over various issues, SBSTTA28 ends in Nairobi ahead of CBD COP17 in Yerevan
The 28th meeting of the Subsidiary Body on Scientific, Technical and Technological Advice (SBSTTA28) to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) conclude...
India's Solar Growth Enters a New Era
The Union Cabinet approved the Pradhan Mantri Surya Sarovar Yojana (PM-SSY), a scheme to develop 5,000 MW of Floating Solar Photovoltaic (FSPV) capacity back...
NBA releases Rs 8.22 crore to rice research institutions and rice-growing States
The National Biodiversity Authority (NBA) released Rs 8.22 crore to rice research institutions and rice-growing states under its Access and Benefit Sharing (...
From weather forecasts to climate resilience: The future of farming in India
A recent report examined how integrated weather-data and satellite-observation platforms are reshaping disaster assessment and crop insurance payouts in Indi...
Agricultural waste holds the key to India’s clean energy future
Crop residue (agricultural waste), currently a major contributor to seasonal air pollution through open burning, is being highlighted as an underused clean-e...
India's record renewable generation in July cuts coal's share in power mix to 1-year low
Combined solar and wind output crossed the 100-gigawatt (GW) mark for the first time, peaking at 103.7 GW, and renewable sources accounted for a record 42.8%...
Renewable generation in July cuts coal's share in power mix to 1-year low
India's renewable power generation rose to about 20% of total electricity generation in July, reaching 36.25 billion kilowatt-hours (kWh) — a rise of roughly...
Viksit Bharat 2047 under threat? World Bank says extreme heat costs South Asia 31 million jobs every year
A World Bank report titled "A Livable Future: Protecting Jobs and Growth from Extreme Heat in South Asia's Cities" found that extreme heat already costs Sout...