1. THE CHANGING ROLE OF ENGINEERS IN THE EMERGING GEO-
STRATEGIC ENVIRONMENT
LT COL K C MONNAPPA
MA in Social Work (DU)
Sustainable Development (CEU-Hungary)
Lead Auditor ISO 140001 Env Std
“Human progress is neither automatic nor inevitable. We are faced now with the fact
that tomorrow is today. We are confronted with the fierce urgency of now. In this
unfolding
conundrum of life and history there is such a thing as being too late…We may
cry out desperately for time to pause in her passage, but time is deaf to every plea and
rushes on. Over the bleached bones and jumbled residues of numerous civilizations
are
written the pathetic words: Too late.”
Martin Luther King Jr. ‘Where do we go from here: chaos or community’
Introduction
1. The immense changes in the social, ecological and economic
environments caused by technology and globalization have compelled
organizations worldwide to make overwhelming changes in their purpose,
strategies and structures in order to adapt, survive and succeed. Like a living
organism that learns to adapt itself to its new environment, organizations today
must learn, and learn fast, in order to adapt to rapid environmental changes or
they simply will vanish. Likewise, the Institution of Engineers will also need to
learn continually, to meet the demands of the 21st century. It can be safely
assumed that the engineering today has reached an apex but to scale greater
heights would necessitate its evolution into a “learning, lean and intelligent
profession.” Apart from the need to adapt and survive, the engineering as a
profession has perhaps reached a level of organizational maturity, where it can
now begin to address the higher levels of Abraham Maslow's hierarchy of human
needs: self respect and self actualization.
Environment – A Future Security Threat
2. Few areas of public policy are as contentious as issues surrounding
management of our environment and natural resources. A new generation of
environmental issues is now upon us, defined by greater political, economic,
social, and even cultural complexity. The Human Development Report 2007/2008

2. comes at a time when climate change—long on the international agenda—is
starting to receive the very highest attention that it merits. The recent findings of
the IPCC sounded a clarion call; they have unequivocally affirmed the warming of
our climate system and linked it directly to human activity. The effects of these
changes are already grave, and they are growing. This year’s Report is a
powerful reminder of all that is at stake: climate change threatens a ‘twin
catastrophe’, with early setbacks in human development for the world’s poor
being succeeded by longer term dangers for all of humanity.
3. Damage to the ecosystem is veritably a threat multiplier. This has the
potential to affect the Nation’s security calculus and its impact would resound at
the global, regional and domestic level. Unlike other unconventional challenges,
damage to the ecosystem is caused not by hostile forces but by production and
consumption patterns. Climate change is the defining human development issue
of our generation. All development is ultimately about expanding human potential
and enlarging human freedom. It is about people developing the capabilities that
empower them to make choices and to lead lives that they value. Climate change
threatens to erode human freedoms and limit choice. It calls into question the
Enlightenment principle that human progress will make the future look better than
the past.
4. The desired new global bargain would call upon vulnerable states on the
frontline, like India, to shoulder more responsibility where this issue is concerned.
Not only will its effects be global, damage to the ecosystem is likely to make for
e.g. weather patterns more unpredictable in higher latitudes. With the upper
reaches of the Arctic already warming twice as fast as the rest of the world,
climate change (a direct result of the damage caused to the ecosystem) could
wreak havoc on agriculture, public health and ecosystems in colder lands,
besides helping breed unmanageable viruses. At a time of greater international
divisiveness on core challenges — from disarmament and terrorism to food crisis
— the responsible Institutions within India can ill afford rancour over crisis due to
damage being caused to the ecosystem, which carries the seeds of exacerbating
existing security calculus, without necessarily creating a new category of threats.
5. Some of the major threats to human security come from the deterioration
of the physical environment. Air and water pollution, depletion of underground
water tables, deforestation, desertification, loss of biodiversity, and above all
climate change, are having profound effects on many societies today, and, as
each damage to the environment accumulates and interacts with all the other
damages, the welfare of future generations is endangered as a result. While it is
easy to exaggerate or underestimate the likely impact due to destruction caused
to the ecosystem, three broad strategic effects can be visualized:-
(a) Human security will be the main casualty as damage to the
ecosystem delivers a major blow to vulnerable economic sectors.
Disparities would intensify. The specter of resource conflicts, failed states,

3. large-scale migrations, growing extremism, and higher frequency and
intensity of extreme weather events helps underscore the human security
costs.
(b) Higher frequency of extreme weather events and a rise in ocean
levels are likely to spur greater interstate and intrastate migration —
especially, the poor and vulnerable — from delta and coastal regions to
the hinterland. Such an influx of outsiders may provoke a backlash that
strains internal and regional security. India, for example, could face a huge
refugee influx from the world’s seventh most populous country,
Bangladesh, which is already losing land to saltwater incursion.
(c) Damage to the ecosystem is likely to intensify interstate and
intrastate competition over natural resources. A new form of warfare over
water, for example, could unfold, with Asia as the hub, given China’s
control over Tibet — the source of all of Asia’s major rivers except the
Ganges. Accelerated melting of glaciers and mountain snows would affect
river-water flows. (Though higher average temperatures are likely to bring
more rainfall in the tropics.)
National Action Plan on Climate Change
6. Sensing the heightened security threat wrought in by the effects of
environmental degradation, India released the National Action Plan on Climate
Change (NAPCC) on 30 June 2008. The principles guiding the NAPCC are as
follows:-
(a) Protecting the poor and vulnerable sections of society through an
inclusive and sustainable development strategy, sensitive to climate
change.
(b) Achieving national growth objectives through a qualitative change
in direction that enhances ecological sustainability, leading to further
mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions.
(c) Devising efficient and cost-effective strategies for end use Demand
Side Management.
(d) Deploying appropriate technologies for both adaptation and
mitigation of greenhouse gases emissions extensively as well as at an
accelerated pace.
(e) Engineering new and innovative forms of market, regulatory and
voluntary mechanisms to promote sustainable development.

4. (f) Effecting implementation of programmes through unique linkages,
including with civil society and local government institutions and through
public private-partnership.
(g) Welcoming international cooperation for research, development,
sharing and transfer of technologies enabled by additional funding and a
global IPR regime that enables technology transfer to developing
countries under the UNFCCC.
7. The document postulates that, in dealing with the challenge of climate
change, both the public and private sector must act on several fronts in a focused
manner simultaneously. The National Action Plan hinges on the development
and use of new technologies. The focus will be on promoting understanding of
climate change, adaptation and mitigation, energy efficiency and natural resource
conservation. There are Eight National Missions which form the core of the
National Action Plan, representing multi-pronged, long-term and integrated
strategies for achieving key goals in the context of climate change. They are as
follows:-
(a) National Solar Mission
(b) National Mission for Enhanced Energy Efficiency
(c) National Mission on Sustainable Habitat
(d) National Water Mission
(e) National Mission for Sustaining the Himalayan Ecosystem
(f) National Mission for a "Green India"
(g) National Mission for Sustainable Agriculture
(h) National Mission on Strategic Knowledge for Climate
ROLE OF THE ENGINEERS
8. Having established the need for limiting future climate change and for
helping the most vulnerable adapt to what is unavoidable, one has to move on
and identify the nature of the policies that will help us get the results we seek.
Several things can be said at the outset:
(a) First, non-marginal changes are needed, given the path the world is
on. We need big changes and ambitious new policies.
(b) Second, there will be significant short term costs. We have to invest
in limiting climate change. There will be large net benefits over time, but at
the beginning, like with every investment, we must be willing to incur the
costs. This will be a challenge for democratic governance: political
systems will have to agree to pay the early costs to reap the long term
gains.
(c) Leadership will require looking beyond electoral cycles.

5. 9. The institute of engineers to this extent would have a pivotal role to play in
shaping up the environment with energy efficient buildings, lesser polluting
vehicles, new methods for harnessing power and the list could go on endlessly.
In short, the nation’s security environment would partly rest on the initiatives and
the innovations the Indian engineers would be able to come up with in the near
future.
10. The vision of the Engineers should be to make India’s economic
development energy efficient. Over a period of time, they must pioneer a
graduated shift from economic activity based on fossil fuels to one based on non-
fossil fuels and from reliance on non-renewable and depleting sources of energy
to renewable sources of energy. In this strategy, the sun should occupy the
center stage, as it should, being literally the original source of all energy. The
Institute of Engineers should pool all scientific, technical and managerial talents,
with sufficient financial resources, to develop solar energy as a source of
abundant energy to power our economy and to transform the lives of our people.
The success in this endeavour will change the face of India. It would also enable
India to help change the destinies of people around the world. In pursuing this
and other ambitious goals, the greatest assets in the wisdom, creativity and
enterprise of the engineers would be crucial.
CONCLUSION
11. The climate change that the world is already locked into has the potential
to result in large-scale human development setbacks, first slowing, then stalling
and reversing progress in poverty reduction, nutrition, health, education and
other areas. Developing countries and the world’s poor cannot avert these
setbacks by acting alone—nor should they have to. The Institute of Engineers
can lead the way.