The disaster management unit (DMU) of the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) is all for forming a climate change department in the civic body.
Mahesh Narvekar, chief officer of the DMU, made this statement at Climate Crisis: Action for Tropical Coastal Cities, an event organised by non-profit initiative Mumbai First. The chief officer said he would talk to Municipal Commissioner Praveen Pardeshi to set up a separate climate change department.
Mr. Narvekar along with Sanjay Bhatia, chairman, Mumbai Port Trust; Mohanasundar Radhakrishnan from Integrating the Healthcare Enterprise (IHE) Delft Institute of Water Education, The Netherlands; and Dr. Kapil Gupta, civil engineering professor at Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay; discussed the climate crisis in Mumbai and tropical coastal cities.
The DMU chief officer said Mumbai is an almost fully developed city and more development is difficult. “The 2005 flood was an eye-opening disaster. The small control room was upgraded to a large emergency operation centre monitoring the entire city. As it is an unplanned city, commuters from the suburbs travel south in the day, raising the population to four million, whereas the night population remains as low as 17,000. Evacuation of this uneven distribution of people becomes a huge challenge for the civic department during disasters,” he said.
Mr. Narvekar said that earlier, the BMC had just two weather stations, but the number has since gone up to 60, with stations in different parts of the city showing the real-time air quality.
Mr. Bhatia said the Mumbai Port Trust was working to prevent natural disasters. “On the Eastern Waterfront, our main agenda is to redevelop almost 200 hectares into an open space with a huge lake, which will work as a reservoir in times of floods. We have completely stopped the consumption of coal at the port, which will also decrease the impact on the climate. Even the new water transport initiatives, like hovercraft and Ro-Ro ferries, can be used to evacuate people during the time of emergency,” he said.
Mr. Gupta said development increases floods by nine times and suggested a few measures to counter climate change.
“Green roofs at the top of buildings can be made obligatory to compensate the loss of green cover on the ground. Installing a 1,000 litre water tank for rainwater harvesting decreases the loss of water by 43%. Detention ponds can be constructed at various places to store the flood water and can be used alternatively during normal situations. Cities with lack of space can build large underground storage systems like in Hong Kong, which is under a football field,” Mr. Gupta said.
Mr. Radhakrishnan said a city should be frequently upgraded like a smartphone and people should be consulted about climate crisis. “Any plan needs at least six months to one year for the approval and listing in the municipal budget, but initially there should be a political will behind it,” he said.
