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Rishika Pardikar

@rishpardikar.bsky.social

3.7K followers 320 following 590 posts

Environment and climate reporter covering science, law & policy | Drilled, Article-14, AGU's Eos, African Arguments, Frontline 📍Bengaluru, India

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Rishika Pardikar @rishpardikar.bsky.social · May 23

A 'Coal in India' explainer for @drilledmedia.bsky.social. Historical roots to nationalisation & back to privatisation, worker issues, Adani & state favour, resistance by Adivasi communities & police action & underground mining. Context: non-existent energy transition
drilled.media/news/india-c...

In India’s Coal Belt, a Window into the Challenges Facing Energy Transition

India’s reliance on coal is tied to a complex set of economic, social, and energy security factors; any successful energy transition plan will have to address all of them.

drilled.media

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Reposted by Rishika Pardikar

Rishika Pardikar @rishpardikar.bsky.social · 1d

Bureaucratic delays and chronic underfunding are hallmarks of doing science in Global South countries. And we hear about such challenges often. New report documenting how scientists in countries like Kenya and India navigate such challenges. Lots of tips here and a vision for a collaborative future

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ClimateActionNetwork @canclimateaction.bsky.social · 3h

🚨 WEBINAR ALERT: The Renewable Energy Tracker 2025

Our new report tracks the Energy Transition in 16 countries. Beyond gigawatts, we're monitoring justice and who really benefits.

🗓 Date: Oct. 15, 2025
🔗 Register here: shorturl.at/q4TTY

#changingcourse #JustTransition

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Rishika Pardikar @rishpardikar.bsky.social · 3h

One of India's leading public interest lawyers in the Supreme Court read my report for @drilledmedia.bsky.social 😀

ICYMI drilled.media/news/modi-ad...

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Reposted by Rishika Pardikar

Markus Eichhorn @markuseichhorn.bsky.social · 5h

Mordecai Ogada is never afraid of challenging received opinion and always worth listening to. Before mythologising Jane Goodall we should recognise that she wasn't a hero to everyone in conservation.

Rishika Pardikar @rishpardikar.bsky.social · 1d

This is from a very prominent conservationist from Kenya

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Rishika Pardikar @rishpardikar.bsky.social · 5h

Honestly fascinating that the concept of sustainability missed her entirely! She worked in so many tropical forests but clearly never bothered to learn about indigenous lives and livelihoods

Reposted by Rishika Pardikar

Ketan Joshi @ketanjoshi.co · 5h

In recent years it was always framed as a pseudo-progressive thing, which almost makes it worse.

bsky.app/profile/keta...

Ketan Joshi @ketanjoshi.co · Oct 8

Whole suite of seemingly progressive arguments that turn gross bc they're env policies, not basic rights.

Eg, Jane Goodall: "If you're really poor you destroy the environment, you cut down the last trees to make land to grow more food for your family, or fish the last fish"

Then, we also have to alleviate poverty. Because if you're really poor you destroy the environment, you cut down the last trees to make land to grow more food for your family, or fish the last fish. Or if you're in an urban area you buy the cheapest junk food. You don't have the luxury of asking: how is this made, did it harm the environment, did it lead to the suffering of animals like in the factory farms, is it cheap because of child slave labor? You just have to buy the cheapest in order to survive.

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Ketan Joshi @ketanjoshi.co · 5h

I know Jane Goodall was revered by many in the environment movement, but it is pretty clear that she also harboured many seriously problematic colonial attitudes.

The 'overpopulation' stuff in particular was pretty bad, and as a concept the conduit of plenty of serious wrongdoing over the years

Rishika Pardikar @rishpardikar.bsky.social · 1d

This is from a very prominent conservationist from Kenya

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Rishika Pardikar @rishpardikar.bsky.social · 9h

Part 2 here

www.downtoearth.org.in/climate-chan...

Rishika Pardikar @rishpardikar.bsky.social · 14h

Another example: consider what comes to your mind when someone says "Switzerland". I can bet it's not "hoarding of black money from around the world"

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Rishika Pardikar @rishpardikar.bsky.social · 14h

Recently, Germany's chancellor defended Israel saying Israel is doing the dirty work for all of us. Yep. Arm & fund Israel but never get your own hands dirty

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Rishika Pardikar @rishpardikar.bsky.social · 14h

PR agencies world over can take lessons from Europe. Hundreds of billionaires but we don't know much about them (unlike in the US & India). Doesn't mine a lot but signs colonial agreements with African countries to import raw material & export high-value items, effectively screwing them over twice

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Rishika Pardikar @rishpardikar.bsky.social · 15h

Some important perspectives about the context in which climate action ought to be framed in developing countries. By @aygoswami.bsky.social and @trishant.bsky.social

www.downtoearth.org.in/climate-chan...

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Benjamin Braun @benbraun.bsky.social · 1d

If profits shape the energy transition we need to understand the biggest profit event this century: the 2022 oil and gas price spike.

Very happy our paper is now out in Energy Research & Social Science. Thread by lead-author @gregorsemieniuk.bsky.social 👇

Gregor Semieniuk @gregorsemieniuk.bsky.social · 1d

🚨NEW PAPER🚨
We all know the 2022 energy price shock fueled the cost of living crisis. It also caused a profit bonanza for the very rich. We show the US reaped the largest profits ($377bn) of any country. 50% went to the richest 1%, only 1% to the bottom 50%. A🧵 www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

River or sankey diagram showing the allocation of profits from global oil and gas companies to quantiles of the US wealth size distribution via financial system intermediaries, such as asset managers, and categories of ultimate beneficiaries, such as business owners, pension funds and shareholders in listed companies. The scale is hundreds of billions of US dollars, and ultimately 50.4% of profits reaching the US personal wealth distribution go to the richest 1% of households.

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Drop Site @dropsitenews.com · 1d

🏆Omar M. Yaghi, born in 1965 to Palestinian refugee parents in Amman, Jordan, has been awarded the 2025 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. He shares the honor with Susumu Kitagawa and Richard Robson for their pioneering work in metal–organic frameworks (MOFs) — materials that capture carbon dioxide, store...

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Amy Westervelt @amywestervelt.bsky.social · 1d

This story from @rishpardikar.bsky.social for @drilledmedia.bsky.social on how Modi's oil & coal cronies are pulling all the strings in India is *wild* not least for the story of the oil baron's son who is going around the world poaching endangered species 🤯 drilled.media/news/modi-ad...

75,000 Endangered and Exotic Animals, SLAPP Suits, and Zero Oversight

How oil and coal billionaires with close ties to the Modi government escape judicial and media scrutiny in India.

drilled.media

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Rishika Pardikar @rishpardikar.bsky.social · 1d

Thanks for reading!

Rishika Pardikar @rishpardikar.bsky.social · 1d

This is from a very prominent conservationist from Kenya

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Rishika Pardikar @rishpardikar.bsky.social · 1d

She was a regular at billionaire clubs like World Economic Forum. Played nice throughout. And made sure there were no consequences when she did finally speak out because she was gone by then. And this is just one line of critique.

We need critical remembrances; not hagiographies that whitewash

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InfluenceMap @influencemap.bsky.social · 1d

📢 🚨New Report - How the UK oil and gas industry spent 15 years pushing for subsidies & incentives for Carbon Capture and Storage rather than regulatory accountability or science-based emissions reductions; maintaining a funding pipeline for a technology yet to deliver on its promises 👇

The UK Oil and Gas Industry's Advocacy on Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS)

New analysis from InfluenceMap suggests that for more than 15 years, the oil and gas industry has systematically pushed the UK government to adopt a costly, emissions-intensive energy policy agenda de...

influencemap.org

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Rishika Pardikar @rishpardikar.bsky.social · 1d

within* a petrochemical refinery

Rishika Pardikar @rishpardikar.bsky.social · 1d

🚨 Two stories unfolded in India recently. They show how Modi govt shields billionaire coal & oil tycoons from scrutiny. One case concerns a private zoo, located with a petrochemical refinery, accused of wildlife trafficking. The other is about SLAPP suits by Adani Group
drilled.media/news/modi-ad...

75,000 Endangered and Exotic Animals, SLAPP Suits, and Zero Oversight

How oil and coal billionaires with close ties to the Modi government escape judicial and media scrutiny in India.

drilled.media

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Rishika Pardikar @rishpardikar.bsky.social · 1d

Based on a talk given by Sammy Wambua, a Kenyan scientist working on conservation genomics who I met at the Student Conference on Conservation Science-Bengaluru and interviewed at length later.

Published in The Hindu newspaper www.thehindu.com/sci-tech/sci...

‘Global South scientists can tip red tape by thinking, working together’

Navigating bureaucratic hurdles and funding shortages in scientific research in the Global South, with insights from Dr. Sammy Wambua.

www.thehindu.com

Rishika Pardikar @rishpardikar.bsky.social · 1d

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Forrest Fleischman @forrestf.bsky.social · 5d

A team I am a part of is hiring an India-based part time research assistant to help us with textual analysis of government forestry documents related to forest restoration and pastoral livelihoods in Himachal Pradesh. Information and application instructions here: forms.gle/4D6aVqtDU7FY...

forms.gle

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Ketan Joshi @ketanjoshi.co · 2d

A complete flip of the usual pattern we see in these updates - China's and India's emissions fell, and EU and US emissions increased.....

ember-energy.org/latest-insig...

@ember-energy.org

Global CO2 emissions plateau
Global CO2 emissions from the power sector fell marginally by 12 MtCO2 (-0.2%) to 6,963 MtCO2 in the first half of 2025. The decline was possible because solar and wind power exceeded demand growth and led to a slight fall in fossil fuel use. Without solar and wind growth, emissions would have risen by an estimated 236 MtCO2 (+3.9%) globally, which is equivalent to almost all emissions (251 MtCO2) from Africa in H1-2025.

At the country level, there was significant variation. Among the four economies that account for the majority of global emissions (64%), emissions fell in China (-46 MtCO2, -1.7%) and India (-24 MtCO2, -3.6%), as clean electricity outpaced growth in demand in those countries.

In contrast, emissions rose in the EU (+13 MtCO2, +4.8%), where strong growth in solar was outweighed by shortfalls in wind, hydro and bioenergy, leading to higher gas and coal generation. Emissions also rose in the US (+33 MtCO2, +4.3%), as clean electricity growth was smaller than demand growth, leading to an increase in coal generation, which was exacerbated by gas-to-coal switching.

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